The Seven or Eight Deaths of Stella Fortuna

by Juliet Grames

This was the trouble with emigration—it dismantled the patriarchy. Because really, what did Assunta, or any woman, need a husband for, when she did every goddamn thing herself?

“You can only name someone else’s sins if you know those sins yourself.”

“You make sure you are good, but you don’t worry whether other people are good or not because they must make their own peace with God.”

Without faith there are no miracles, just coincidences.

wanted to come to America because I heard the streets were paved with gold. When I got here, I learned three things: One, the streets weren’t paved with gold. Two, the streets weren’t paved at all. Three, I was expected to pave them. —“OLD ITALIAN STORY,” ELLIS ISLAND

Which do you want, a full bottle or a drunk wife? —CALABRESE PROVERB

I will offer my opinion that it is the moral responsibility of the incompetent to identify their own weaknesses and not accept positions of power.

History marches on, and names and destinations change, but not the injustices we let one another suffer.

But what if we said that the power of human faith is in making things real even when they are not—that by giving imaginary entities our credence we allow them to assume power over us—to step into being? Because what is faith but a willingness to believe?