The Fig Thief

Perennial themes—family, identity, tradition, place—take center stage in Belfiglio’s ruminative if uneven debut. Whether the poems concern Belfiglio’s Italian heritage, her romantic relationships, or the places she’s lived, they point always toward the importance of relationships to one’s identity. “A compelling story can pin/ my attention more than anything,” she writes, an interest evidenced by the many stories relayed here, including her grandfather’s 1912 immigration to the United States. The collection is replete with familial names, domestic trappings like furniture and food, and the mythology of Italian American clans. In a second thread that traces urban life and queer desire, the poems feel somewhat predictable. The brightest moments come in entries like “Basin,” which focuses on specifics that more convincingly evoke urban longing (“Maybe you won’t feel alone/ if you look into every set of eyes/ like a friend’s”) and elicits deeper emotional responses than the volume’s more abstract pieces. “I’d rather live in the what if,” Belfiglio writes, and the best of these poems glimmer with their accounting of a life full of what-ifs. There are moments of sincere reflection to be found here. (Oct.)