Thumbprints and Tree Rings

 

Are basically the same, yeah? Circular markings

on living beings that show we originate from one

genius source, one brilliant astral scientist who saw

the stunning in all creation and said, I think I’ll

leave them symbols of their innate connection

to one other, hide them in plain sight.

Make it special when they close their eyes and lean

toward the light, like sunflowers. Maybe this is why

people hugs trees, smell roses, ground themselves

barefoot on grass—to know we are in this together.

Still, I ask Big They why we wreck the very things

that sustain us, cut off our noses to spite our faces.

Still, I admire trees more than ever: their grandeur,

elegance, fierce giant magi always pointing up

at the stars. And stars, stardust! We are made of that too—

carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen atoms created in previous

generations of stars over 4.5 billion years ago.

We forget how much earth we contain, how much

space we hold. Like right now, I’m sitting on my bed

watching the oak outside my window house two sparrows.

She is me, spirited but strong. I am her, hopeful and still.

 

Marina Carreira

Marina Carreira (she/they) is a queer Luso-American poet and artist from Newark, NJ. A Pushcart Prize nominee and 2024 Luso-American fellow in the DISQUIET Literary Program, Carreira is the author of Dead Things and Where to Put Them (Cavankerry, forthcoming 2025), Desgracada (Bottlecap Press, 2023), Tanto Tanto (Cavankerry Press, 2022), Save the Bathwater (Get Fresh Books, 2018), and I Sing To That Bird Knowing It Won’t Sing Back (Finishing Line Press, 2017). She has exhibited her art at the Newark Museum, Morris Museum, ArtFront Galleries, Monmouth University Center for the Arts, among others. Carreira works in higher education and teaches Women and Gender Studies at Kean University. Find her on Instagram at @savethebathewater.