Cinema Paradiso

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Romulo Vite

 

Starlit night on New Year’s,

with broken porcelain plates

and subtle chimes of utensils

scattered across the streets of Sicily.

A man walks along the road,

his head hanging low, as

red and white fireworks illuminate

a fresh start.

 

Alfredo was right,

“If he loves, he suffers,

knowing it’s a dead-end street,”

but she meant something more

to me.

 

I spent more than 100 days and nights

waiting for her window to open,

just to end up like Salvatore.

I walk alone among broken uselessness,

my heart longs for her

velvet red kiss

one last time.

 

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Romulo Vite is a first generation Peruvian-American from Rahway, New Jersey. He is going to attend Mason Gross to major in Music, specifically Music education. He will be graduating around 2026 and will continue to write poetry and sing in the choir as much as he can for Rutgers.

Romulo wrote this poem in a creative writing poetry course taught by Joanna Fuhrman. Fuhrman selected the piece for inclusion in Writers House Review.