The other day one of the local business owners stopped me to show me some old documents he had since he knows how much they interest me.
Being the descendant of emigrants to America, he particularly wanted to show me an old book of poetry that included a poem about the Emigrants.
The book was old and the cover had long been torn off, but he keeps it safely tucked away in a box so that it doesn’t get ruined any further.
The poem was written around 1914 in semi-dialect, but no author was mentioned.
Emigranti
Trenta giorni di macchine e vapore
nella Merica ghe semo rivati,
ma nella Merica che semo rivati
non abbiamo trovato nè paglia nè fieno.
Abbiam dormito sul nudo terreno
come le bestie che va a riposà.
E la Merica l’è lunga, l’è larga,
circondata di fiumi e montagne,
e coll’aiuto dei nostri Italiani,
abbiam formato paesi e città!
I’ve translated it as follows,
in America we arrived,
but in America as we arrived
we found neither straw nor hay.
We slept on the bare earth
like the beasts who go to rest.
And America is long and wide,
surrounded by rivers and mountains,
and with the help of our Italians,
we created towns and cities!
Whenever I think about those who emigrate to a new country, I am always amazed at those brave souls who, often with only a few dollars in their pockets and speaking only a couple of words of the language (if any), dare to try to start a new life elsewhere.
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What a wonderful poem. I’m going to print it out and put it in the binder I have with the old postcards, letters and pictures from Palmoli. Thank you for translating the poem.
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Mary Reply:
June 26th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
I’m glad you enjoyed it Cathy!
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I don’t want to rock your world, but they might be talking about south america. As i.e. in argentina being a favorite of italian emigrants. I read about the “dollar” and immediately thought about the usual mistake of US citizens believing their country being called America… when it’s actually US of A.
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Mary Reply:
June 26th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
No world rocking here. I’m well aware that many of the emigrants went to South America and that this poem could be referring to that part of a “Merica”. No matter where they went, most of them went with very little money and very few possessions. It took a lot of courage.
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In my family my grandfather Pagano and two of his brothers went to the USA- Pennsylvania and another brother went to Argentina.
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Mary Reply:
July 1st, 2009 at 10:50 am
I’ve heard of quite a few families that did that. In fact, there are a lot of Palmolesi descendants in Argentina.
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