Sound Bites, Issue 7 – Sophia Gatti (she/her)

ABOUT OUR AUTHOR:

Hi! I am Sophia Gatti, and I am a senior here at the Pitt-Greensburg. I am a Creative and Professional Writing major, with a minor in Secondary Education. Outside of school, I am a singer/songwriter, and my music can be heard and found under my stage name, “Carmela Donna.” I love to write songs and poetry; both are my strengths.

Four Poems by Sophia Gatti

pretending to celebrate christmas 

spreads of italian and polish

foods sit on the counter.

as my older sister

begins to bread the

white, strange baccalà.

she took over this role,

after my aunt passed away.

my aunt was the one

who made sunday-sauce every sunday

and sipped pepsi,

never coke.

typically on holidays,

i devote most time

sitting in the corner

reminiscing on the ones

i’ll never get back.

the ones that passed.

the ones that faded.

the ones where

my uncle tim was there

to ask me about my music

to ask me about school

to ask me about anything.

no longer can those conversations ever be.

such a strange notability

when the number of

people attending the holidays

vanishes less n less.

to prove this sad reality to myself,

i sit in the corner

counting the number of times

the door opens this year.

the number only

 swells me more depressed.

this holiday is not a holiday.

this holiday is like carrying on any other day.

the type of day of,

“we have to do this.”

“we have to go on.”

even if there is no aunt donna,

who brought the most love.

even without uncle tim,

who brought the most fun.

yet here we are, pretending to celebrate christmas. 

~i remember turning twenty~

i remember the unicorn candles on the cheesecake

i remember thinking, “either my family doesn’t know me at all,

or these were the only fucking candles at the store”

i was never a unicorn kid.

seeing them flicker n placed on my twentieth birthday cake

made me want to pick them up lit,

hold them to the edges of the cake

and let the flames conquer.

i wanted to watch the whole thing burn.

i remember turning 20, again

i remember the taste of disappointment in my mouth

i remember the way my left hand tingled for too long.

since i’ve been a kid, my limbs & mind

crafted a bonded deal to send a

tingling sting through my left hand,

anytime distress claims me.

i think the tingle is my body’s way of basically saying,

“you are fucking depressed.”

~photoshopping out my third heartbreak~ 

i still have the photo of you & i 

on the black apartment couch. 

snow is on the table 

and most likely on your teeth. 

the last night our bodies touched, 

you made me feel irrevocably in love. snow does have a way of offering light to a heart 

but in the end, it always melts. 

now that you are gone, 

i tend to look at that photo 

more than i did when you were around. 

i replay the day you left. 

walking out the door, 

you vanished like a cold-chilled-wind. 

we both knew that 

was the last time we would ever see each other. 

i faded us both out, 

the only sights remaining in the picture 

are the black couch and the snow. 

why should our bodies be in it 

when to me you’re just a fever-faint memory, 

and to you i am dead?

mt. washington outlook / pittsburgh, pa 

the breeze that blows

through my body,

when up at the outlook,

is a delightful, divine

almost dust-like feeling.

when staring past the dark,

the city looks luminating.

like there is hope.

there it is!

there is the chance of change

you have been praying for.

i swear at night,

there is magic floating

all through the air,

within the place you stand

to view this cultured city.

mt. washington to me

is a place to go to feel again.

a place to go to reconnect with my light-side.

a place that friends and i

 scattered mary-jane smoke

and discussed just why we fucking loved

every part of pittsburgh, pa.