Peter Piccolomini

I was born in Leominster, Mass on a cold day. It was a small manufacturing town mainly made up of French and Italians. Where the river that runs through it is filthy like the worst day in hell. In the early 1970's, my family moved to Southern Indiana in a dreary and desolate town called Newburgh on the Ohio River. There was no salami or fresh Italian bread at the grocery, and the Bruins were not on T.V., so we hated it there. I realized I was a poet by age 9 on a bus ride coming home from elem.school. I discovered what it felt like to live where there was a certain chill in the air in late autumn, a definite darkness, and a countryside filled with beautiful corn fields. I loved to daydream. Originally,I had no friends, so I couldn't wait to get home and write about my displacement in life. I felt empowered, not self pity. My life is a rough draft, so I wanted to share that with you here. And no matter what happens in my life - Still, I rise.