My Calabria

Two years ago, I began a genealogy search of my grandfather, Giuseppe Benincasa that became an intricate labyrinth that wound its way to and from the center core of who he was. My convoluted search formed the story and painting I made of him. My “Dear Papaco Journal,” part day log and part “phone booth” was where I could talk to him as if he were listening on the other end.

Now I turn my artist eye to the old woman seated in the worn leather chair with eyes closed and fingering her rosary beads. Beyond her whispered words and faded decades, she has stories to tell and secrets to share. But first I must find her through a trail of records. Will they be enough?

Puzzle pieces in and of themselves are shaped little hints of a bigger picture. Only when pieces fit into place does an image triumph. I soon discover that in death as in life, she is a puzzle. So many things she kept to herself but, always, with eyes that remember what words cannot say.

A genealogy search can yield many things and go down many paths, but at its core, it is a story waiting to be told and a person to tell it.

My grandfather, Giuseppe Benincasa’s story began 10 years ago, when my cousin Helen Salfi Gorday gave me a charred book of Italian love poems. She said that it belonged to our grandfather and that I should have it.

The book is, “Postuma” by Lorenzo Stecchetti, an author who didn't exist, yet became a leader of the Veristi Literary movement in Italy after it was published in 1877. The Veristi were the anti-Romantic, Bohemian new realists who brought fresh language and energy to poetry. The real author, Oilindo Guerrini, created this suffering, doomed cousin, Lorenzo Stecchetti by beginning the book with a letter concerning his obituary. The country was scandalized by his ruse, and the book went into multiple printings. At this time poetry had been in a lull and the Veristi ignited public interest in poetry. What was he doing with this book and why was it burned?