Photo of Marlene Pasini in an illustration by Global Voices. Photo used with permission.

To talk about Marlene Pasini is to talk about a Mexican woman and all that that implies: colour, beauty, sensitivity, intensity, and culture.  

In fact, I imagine Marlene Pasini's feet to be like a beautiful map where all stories and all paths are drawn. She has eyes that reveal one of those souls who has seen everything without ever losing the capacity for wonder. 

Renaissance woman par excellence, Pasini has developed diverse interests to which she has dedicated her passion and intelligence. She is a communicologist, a writer, a poet, an editor, a visual artist, and a psychotherapist and coach in Transpersonal Education. If that wasn't enough, she has continued her studies, obtaining a Master's degree in Literature and a diploma in Renaissance History, Egyptology, and hieroglyphics. She is the author of eighteen books: poetry, novels, essays, articles, and books on personal and spiritual development.  

The publication of her most recent book called “Memorias de Aquí” (Memories of Here) is, as the author mentions, part of a series of poetry books that she has produced on the theme of her life and experience as a traveller, poet and artist. This text is a testimony to her commitment to the mystical and spiritual experience, in which she includes clear references to each of the places she has visited — places that have visited her at the same time. This relationship has left indelible marks on her memory, which she shares with us, in the most sublime way: through poetry. 

It is interesting how, at a certain point in life, it becomes necessary to leave a testimony of the path undertaken, and this reminiscence of experiences began with “Memorias Nómadas del Medio Oriente al Norte de África” (Nomadic Memoirs from the Middle East to North Africa). This is the first publication in this series, which was published in 2021 — in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic — and which was the result of the author's travels to the Holy Land, Tunisia, Morocco, and Egypt, with poems written over several years that were illustrated by some of the poet's own paintings. Later, in the year 2023, “Memorias de Andalucía” (Memories of Andalusia) was produced, and through brief, Japanese-style texts like haikus and tankas, the author immerses the reader in the experience of visiting Spain.

“Memorias de aquí” was published in August 2024. Its structure contains four autobiographical sections, but with clear reasons for their division. 

The first part is titled: De las memorias del alma (From the memories of the soul), and is made up of poems that allude to Pasini's memories, as well as her personal experiences, which give an account of an inner voice that reflects on life and the passing of time. In them, one can appreciate nostalgia, longing, dreams, the personal connection with nature and its presence in the journey that is life.

The word I would use to define this part of the work is melancholy, and as an example:

LLUVIA

Nada es silencio…

Aquí en esta ciudad

llega el verano

y una música de lluvia

empapa sus calles de asfalto

En el instante y su tiempo fugitivo

en la incertidumbre del más allá

donde la vida aletea

como negra mariposa

en el hueco del insomnio

donde los recuerdos se ovillan

en sombra enmudecida

desciendo despacio

en un largo sueño.

RAIN

Nothing is silent…

Here in this city

summer arrives

and a musical rain

soaks its asphalt streets

In the moment and it's fleeting time

in the uncertainty of the beyond

where life flutters

like a black butterfly

in the hollow of insomnia

where memories coil

in muted shadow

I descend slowly

into a lengthy dream.

It is from the journey through melancholy that we reach Caminos citadinos y Pueblos Mágicos de México (City Roads and Magical Towns of Mexico). In this chapter, the poet shares some of the cities and towns that she has visited throughout her life and that are somehow significant, not for their touristic qualities, but for their historic and ancestral nature, as a part of Pasini's “Mexicanness,” and for the strategic connection with her soul.

FLAMBOYANES

Rojo estallido

el follaje de los flamboyanes

una tarde de mayo

Una brizna suave del viento

corta erizadas alas 

de pájaros en vuelo

Incandescente sol

como una ofrenda

su luz contra pieles color moreno

Cuernavaca

ciudad de la eterna primavera

hondura de suspiros en sus haciendas

tardes de nostalgia

y el eco de los siglos.

FLAME TREES

Red burst

the foliage of the flame trees

an afternoon in May

A soft breeze of wind

cuts the ruffled wings

of birds in flight

Incandescent sun

like an offering

its light against dark skin

Cuernavaca

city of eternal spring

depth of sighs in its haciendas

afternoons of nostalgia

and the echo of the centuries.

Atavismos, is the word that gives its name to the third section, which represents a symbolism that resonates with the idea of Ancestry. It runs between mysticism and a reunion with the ancestral Mexican past.

MUJER INDÍGENA EN TEPOZTLÁN

Borda sueños de magia

con sus manos

en múltiples colores hila

toda una vida sobre su nívea tela

Con una sonrisa apenas perfilada en su boca

finge que no hay sufrimiento

ante este pueblo rodeado

por el gran cerro del Tepozteco

Su rostro moreno — arrugado

y trenzas de color azabache

están cenizos por las polvaredas

que dejan los caminos

tierra suelta

olvido

hambre

Envuelta en rebozo gris y coloridas enaguas

ha quedado en sus manos

olores de hierba y hongos

lo amarillo de la flor

recogidos al alba.

INDIGENOUS WOMAN IN TEPOZTLÁN

She embroiders dreams of magic

with her hands

in multi-colours she weaves

a whole life on her snowy fabric

with the trace of a smile on her mouth

she pretends there is no suffering

before this town surrounded

by the great Tepozteco mountain

Her dark face – wrinkled

and braids jet-black

are ashy from the dust-clouds

left by the roads

loose earth

forgetfulness

hunger

Wrapped in a grey shawl and colourful petticoats

on her hands remains

the smell of grass and mushrooms

the yellow of the flower

collected at dawn.

The last section of this work belongs to Sombras luminosas (Luminous shadows); poetic allusions to people, beings and characters that are not found in the physical world, but whose presence is still a reality through time.

Here is a small fragment of the poem ¿Qué lazos nos unen y desunen? (What ties unite and separate us?):

A mi padre

In memoriam

Materia en sustancia de luz eterna

Memoria

silencio

casa habitada en sueños

con una oración

levantada al cielo de la Gloria

formas diluyéndose en viento.

To my father

In memoriam

Matter in substance of eternal light

Memory

silence

house inhabited in dreams

with a prayer

raised to the heaven of Glory

forms dissolving into wind.

My recommendation is, of course, to enjoy the leap of faith that it takes to go along with the words of a writer who has decided to revel in this poetic work that clearly shows the ability to understand that geography and time are conventions, and that beauty lives in the untouchable space of every human being: the spirit and that intangible essence.