Red Rocks Park, Vermont

I did not know there would be water on the mountain.
Seventh of March, first sunny day
After a three-month freeze. I thought
there’d be snow.
What was left of the snow was slush,
and even the slush was disappearing
into puddles and the puddles pooled
so full they started flowing
down, down, down the mountain,
over the rocks and around the trees,
soaking my sneakers, my sneakers soaking
my feet.

There was one breath where I looked down and saw myself.
Woman - No, not temporary woman-feet.
Water.
Water. One day
I will finally be the runoff
springing down the mountain
the way we ran with our child-feet
from the swingset, ‘cross the lawns, down
to the beach,
gunning for that lake splash in,
gunning for home.

Decided

I will forgive you if it takes my lifetime.
I will forgive you if it takes my lifetime.
If I don’t then all the love I thought I knew
was lovelessness.
If I don’t then all the love I thought I knew
was just attachment,
was just greed,
was just a whole bunch of gimme-gimme.
I will forgive you if it takes my lifetime.
For how could I let down the lightning bug?
How could I let down the comet sky?
I cannot stand before them as a bitter-hearted thing.
Let the nightgrass bless this vow.

Natalli Amato is the assistant to the editor of Rolling Stone. Her first poetry collection, On a Windless Night, was published in 2019 by Ra Press. Her poetry has appeared in Darling Magazine, the Lily Review, and the Speckled Trout Review. In 2021, her work will appear in Blueline, Breaking Bread Magazine, and the Great Lakes Review. She lives in Sackets Harbor, New York.