I was five years old,
reading the dictionary in the bathroom

of 65 Saratoga Street;

avid, I was, for cumbrous words

like quattuordecillion.

Whenever I visited Nana's house

in nearby Somerville,

I was intent on solving

the mysteries of the pantry

where sunlight scowled

in shades of brown

like ancient photographs.

We moved to Morris Street,
and I turned six,
and Jimmy Napoli, all grown up

at age twelve,

taught me the Our Father and the Hail Mary
on a small blackboard in the basement.

Always there was the smell of sauce
coming from triple-deckers
where Italian grandmothers
labored over hot stoves
all day every Saturday.
Unfailingly, these same old ladies
could be spotted
sweeping dust and litter
from their sidewalks
on weekday mornings.

I collected 45s
of r-&-b music
that Dad got from his friends
who owned bars with jukeboxes.
When the songs weren't getting
played anymore,
I'd inherit the records:
"Everybody Plays the Fool";
"When Will I See You Again?";
"Rock the Boat";
"You Make Me Feel Brand New."

Then came Bicentennial Minutes
and my month-long case of pneumonia
and Jimmy Carter beating Gerald Ford
19 to 1 in Mrs Stuart's
second-grade mock election.
That dark-haired girl, Lisa,
who said three words all year
was the only one to vote against
the Georgia governor.

I tried sandlot baseball

though I was incompetent with the bat,
hapless at catching flies.
Even worse at football:
touch football, no tackling
for eight-year-olders
(Coach George Smith
did plenty of hollering,
high-strung Vince Lombardi wannabe).

January and February of '78

brought outlandish heaps of snow.
October gave us

the heartbreaking Red Sox'
loss to the Yankees
in the one-game playoff
where Bucky Dent

of the hated pinstripes
homered off the hapless Mike Torrez.

Soon, it was farewell to the Bradley School
and hello to the Joseph H. Barnes:
I had heard rumors of tough kids
who would beat up a "brainiac,"
but my trepidation was unwarranted.
No bruises, physical or mental:
but mockery for wearing "high-waters,"
pants whose legs didn't go all the way down:
that was just about it.

The girls, I found, were merciless,
but I liked them anyway.