The Old Italians Dying (1979). Summary and Description

In this long, proselike poem, Ferlinghetti pays homage to the older Italian immigrants of San Francisco and laments their passing. The poem, however, mourns more than the passing of a few Italian individuals; it grieves for the passing of a way of life.

The speaker of the poem is observing old Italians around the city of San Francisco. Through his descriptions it is possible to envision not only the men themselves, but also their attachments to older ways and their homeland. The speaker at one point tells us that there are “the ones who loved Mussolini the old fascists the / ones who loved Garibaldi the old anarchists reading L’Umanita / Nuova the ones who loved Sacco & Vanzetti” (ll. 24-26).

These old Italians have retained cultural attachments to their country instead of adapting to American ways; Mussolini and Garibaldi were famous Italian revolutionaries, and Sacco and Vanzetti were two Italian anarchists who may have been wrongly convicted and executed for a murder in Massachusetts. The speaker sees a kind of dignity in the way the Italian immigrants cling to their culture and is clearly sad at their passing; “they are almost gone now,” he says at one point.

The poem is also filled with images of death. The speaker notes a funeral procession and says “the black hired hearses draw up the black limousines,” telling us that “the family mourners step out in stiff suits” and that “the widows walk so slowly up the steps of the cathedral fishnet veils drawn down leaning hard on darkcloth arms” (ll. 35, 40-42). In this scene, we see all of the typical trappings of a funeral, the veils worn by widows, the widows themselves, and the black hearses, among other things.

The poem, however, concerns more than the literal death of an Italian immigrant, or, for that matter many Italian immigrants. The death to which Ferlinghetti refers is the death of a way of life and an entire immigrant culture, and he has written this poem to call attention to their plight. The poem, in fact, is filled with images of grief. Near the poem’s conclusion, the speaker focuses not only on the passing of the immigrants, but also on the fact that all of the Italian immigrants who are still alive seem only to be waiting for death themselves.

We are told in the final lines that all the old men do is wait; they are waiting “for the bocce ball to stop rolling” and “waiting for the bell to stop tolling & tolling” and for the “unfinished Paradiso story.” In the end, Ferlinghetti tells us, these men are bereft of hope and are waiting only for their own deaths. But the poem can also be read as a call to action. One of its underlying motives, perhaps, is to encourage us to examine cultures or groups of people with which we might be familiar, and fight to preserve them, or at the very least to see and understand them.

For Discussion or Writing
1. Compare this poem to Allen Tate’s “Ode to the Confederate Dead.” What specific characteristics of the group of people mourned in each poem do the poets praise or lament? What seems to be Tate’s attitude toward the Confederate dead, and how does that attitude contrast with Ferlinghetti’s attitude toward the old Italians?

2. Read Philip Levine’s poem “To Cipriano, in the Wind” as a companion piece to “Old Italians Dying.” What is Levine’s view of the immigrant experience? Many readers might view Levine’s poem as more “personal.” Why might a reader think this, and how does reading the Levine poem alter your view of Ferlinghetti’s?