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A Little Dinner Music sings a new tune for Parallel Press
By Kristin Knipschild
Library Communications
Posted 7/20/2004
MADISON, Wis. -- Tales of food and family make up the latest chapbook of poetry released by the Parallel Press. Stephen Murabito's A Little Dinner Music explores family experiences and stories on a flavorful note.
Murabito's poems range from the title work "A Little Dinner Music" about a relaxing lunch under a tree with his wife to "The Lost Digits of My Ancestors," which tells a story about numerous ancestors that lost fingers, often in accidents related to food. His apparent love for food creatively flavors each poem whether it's the main topic or just a small detailed line of a passage. Many of Murabito's poems also touch on a family theme, describing family gatherings and different dynamics.
Murabito, an associate professor of English at the University of Pittsburgh's Greensburg campus, was a 1992 National Endowment for the Arts grant recipient in poetry. His poems have graced the pages of Beloit Poetry Journal, Mississippi Review, Bellingham Review, 5AM and Poet Lore. Murabito also pens short stories which have been published by North American Review, Antietam Review, Brooklyn Review, Cake Train and Pittsburgh Quarterly On-Line. Murabito is an accomplished professor as well as an accomplished writer. In 2004 he earned the University of Pittsburgh's Chancellor's Distinguished Teaching Award. He currently lives in Saltsburg, Pa. with his wife, April, and their four children, Angelina, Estella, Antonia and Sebastian.
The Parallel Press is an imprint of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries. A Little Dinner Music is the 31st poetry chapbook of the imprint and the third to be released in 2004. Poetry chapbooks may be purchased in groups of six for $50 or $10 each. For more information, visit http://parallelpress.library.wisc.edu/chapbooks/poetry/.
Orders may be sent to:
The Parallel Press
372 Memorial Library
728 State Street
Madison, WI 53706
Phone: (608) 262-2600
E-mail: parallelpress@library.wisc.edu.
A selection from A Little Dinner Music called "The Kielbasa Ghosts."
Syracuse is losing two west side meat markets, the last in the city specializing in freshly made Kielbasa and hams using age-old recipes brought over from the Old World
- Syracuse Post-Standard, May 1, 1997
Polish kielbasa no longer hung in butchers' windows.
- Saul Bellow, Humboldt's Gift
All across America,
The small Polish stores are closing
Down--no more kielbasa, sweet hams,
Kiszka, brown breads, or quarts
Of succulent beer
Inside the old sliding doors.
We are a blood-deep people:
Life doesn't simply hit us
And then go fading away.
We love kielbasa; we're fighters.
And so, like a legion of the sleepwalking starved,
We will descend our porch
Steps and float out
To fill the early morning streets
With the wandering parts of ourselves
That will never rest.
Like flocks of wayward white eagles
In search of the skies themselves,
We will fall on unsuspecting Polish festivals,
Razing the pierogi and golabki tables,
Inhaling the homemade kielbasa and kiszka,
Drinking in the cold beer
Until we are born again
In spinning flesh and blood
And soul on a polka floor,
Where ghost on ghost
We refuse to leave,
Surrounding the son of a son
Of a son of a sausage maker,
Whirling like a crown above his head
Until he moves in the ticking sawdust quiet
Behind a Monday morning meat counter
To say hello to his first customer coming in,
The bells of a thousand tongues ringing at the door.
