Floor Plan by Peter Carellini

Arches and stations of iron and carbon!

Whose callused hands welded you hence -

Wiping sweaty grime from their hardened brow?

And, so I ask, you hulking leviathans docked at port,

From where did you scoop the tools and trade?

Was it the Horn of Good Hope? Or the steppes of Mongolia?

Great towers of stone and glass, that scrape the sun,

However many did it take to raise you skyward -

And where did they come from, what shores and fields traversed?

When, hospitals aplenty, did you summon servants to service the sick?

Where did the papered pages of public libraries get printed -

And whose ink soaked fingers can I thank for such company?

My soda pops and candy bars from never sleeping corner stores,

I too ask them questions!

And sometimes find the answers in Port Morris,

Tucked in tempered gravel and kissed by diesel clouds.

But last I turn to you, Dutch sailors, adventurers of England,

And though my home is my heart, I crook a finger and bark -

whose sacred soil did you trample in the wake of Henry Hudson,

And upon erecting the Empire city,

Ravage a coastal, wetlands paradise?

Peter Carellini is a writer, actor, and filmmaker based in NYC. His short play, Vermin, just debuted as part of the New York Theater Festival lineup to positive audience reception. His writing and visual art has been featured in publications such as Kelp Journal, Mythos Magazine, Travel + Leisure, and Bruxelles Art Vue. He is currently a Pushcart Prize nominee for 2026.