Natalie Marino
Two Poems
Nowhere
The pastel colors of the blooming trees
gradually faded and our faces darkened
as the days passed. Disease monsoons
now monopolize our gaze but the
mansions multiply even as locusts fly
closer in. We realize it’s too late, after
every corporation sucked out the marrow
of our skeletons. The buzz was loud but
we could not hear until we had to lock
ourselves in our tiny houses hoping
the landlord doesn’t change his mind.
Only now do we see a black virus in water.
Your Boat
You want to row in a stream of sparkling
clear water rushing over glistening rock.
It can even overflow, as long as it still
runs in a simple line from A to B, but you
become surrounded by black air and bright
stars that make a never-ending circle tying
you to the past century’s coffins hiding
buried drawings of the past, and you suddenly
see how your shallow thoughts refuse to leave
the shadow of loss, the joy of moments that fly
away from your fingers as time’s tapestry
folds in on itself in layers like limestone.
Natalie Marino‘s work has appeared or is forthcoming in Haikuniverse, Royal Rose Magazine, and Mineral Lit Mag. She holds a BA in American literature from UCLA, and an MD from the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. A family physician, Marino lives in Thousand Oaks, Calif., with her husband and two daughters.
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