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ISBN: 978-1-964277-60-8, 72 pages, $14 (+ shipping)
Release Date: October 22, 2025
The Advance Sale Discount price on this title has expired. For those who prefer to pay by check, the price is $19/book (which includes shipping & sales tax) and should be sent to: Main Street Rag, 12180 Skyview Drive, Edinboro, PA 16412.
Anna Di Martino is a writer, artist, and educator. Her debut poetry collection offers an intimate, unflinching exploration of loneliness and the intricate landscape of the human heart. Through lyrical, visually evocative verse, she delves into the realities of love and loss, and the quiet resilience found in connection. Anna holds an MFA in Creative Writing: Poetry from Pacific University and BA in Art from UC Santa Cruz. She recently started Jackdaw Press, an independent press specializing in poetry. Anna lives in San Diego, where she enjoys spending time with her two daughters and her dog, Arlo. She is currently working on several children’s books as well as a memoir.
The week my dad died, I read Anna Dimartino’s The Last Bite. While these poems do explore death—dying father, dying marriage, dying rabbit—they also bring us into memories of life: watching the dad put on his belt, sharing a bowl of Rocky Road with a spouse, approaching a rabbit eating grass in the yard. In my own grief, these poems brought me connection and comfort. ~Katie Manning, editor-in-chief of Whale Road Review, author of Tasty Other, winner of the Main Street Rag Poetry Book Award
Anna DiMartino’s debut collection beautifully wrestles with the vicissitudes of love and its contradictions. In poems that explore the author’s difficult relationships with men, Ms. DiMartino courageously exposes the violence and addiction that destroy love, yet she also examines a hopeful tenderness that compels her to sustain those relationships. Her yearning for acceptance and her recognition these relationships are unhealthy creates a searing emotional tension that will resonate deeply with her readers. ~Robert Bernard Hass, Executive Director of the Robert Frost Society
Memory, here, is resonant, ringing with bitterness and with tenderness. This perspective, this craft choice, is underscored by beautifully precise language that makes visible life-changing experiences via sensory-rich imagery and sensations. A spoon striking the bottom of bowl. Desiring both freedom and attachment. Anna Di Martino has written emotionally nuanced and unflinching poems, tapping into the swerves and the pauses of life. ~Eduardo C. Corral, author of Guillotine
My father calls to tell me he’s dying–
the priest has come to give him his last rites.
His words, a slow churn of gravel,
each syllable dredged from a muddy gutter.
I assure him there’s no priest, it was a dream.
He tells me he’s made his peace, has no regrets,
then asks about my brother and starts sobbing.
I remember his temper, his thick, calloused hands,
the flash of heat that seared, bloomed raw, his brand
on my skin, but his words, barbed and sharp,
left the indelible marks, hooked deep
into my most tender parts.
Maybe fading memory allows him
to let go, to find peace and maybe
the child in me needs to hold on, to pretend.
And now he tells me there’s a parrot in here,
and I can see the scarlet and emerald wings beating
against the sterile white of his room,
a vibrant burst of life confined, the chirps
and beeps from his monitors morphing
into the rustle of wings, letting him take flight.
When we were still in love
we’d share a bowl of rocky road,
every night together, on that brushed denim couch.
You slipped the small spoon, heaped full, to my lips,
the ice cream melting around the edges. Bite after bite,
that bowl felt bottomless. You didn’t warn me
when we got to the end, just the clang
of the spoon in the empty bowl.
They ask which pronouns I prefer,
and, with all respect, I must confess,
I no longer identify with pronouns.
I am verbs, past tense,
irregular, like used to
which refer to things in the past
that are no longer true
I used to be thin
used to have brown hair, not wiry grays
used to be married, desired
Once, I was she,
until I met him and became we.
In time, we added two new pronouns
to the world, our first she, then our second,
and they were ours. And we all lived together
in a small bungalow, he and I, and our two girls.
We had all that we could want,
but still, we wanted more. And so,
to solve this problem, we settled for less–
divided our household, became us
and him, had less time together,
less money, less happiness.
Everyone assured us in future tense–
everything will be ok.
But I am stuck in past perfect,
if only I had…
If hope is the thing with feathers
that perches in the soul, then despair
is the thistle wedged in tender flesh
beneath the wing, that with each beat
digs itself deeper.
Bedtime, abundant hope, the fluffing
of the pillows, the shedding of the robe,
a few lines of verse, lamplight, night sky
with a slice of moon just bright enough.
The sandman waits, his bony little hand hovering
over his pail. And then you think you see him reach
for a handful of sand to seal your eyes in sleep,
but instead of sand, he sprinkles water
from his fingertips, dousing the last embers
of hope for rest, and, for what is left of night,
you lie there, listening to the hiss.