The Rain

The rain pours in, filling up gutters and drains, drenching the garden, slipping down the sides of the banks, overflowing the dam, its glassy surface covered with lilies and moonlit clouds.  Heavier, heavier, sheets of steady drumming, nothing left of space between the drops, only a wall of water pouring out of the sky.  Only a world of water, a moving blanket that covers it all, out there.  If we would walk in it, out there, it would not be a wall, finite, it would be a river in the air to have to keep moving through.

The whiteness of the sound.  Like torrents tumbling.  A waterfall of air, airy water, watery air.  Triumphant, transcendent, filling up the night.  Filling up the black beyond my window.  Filling up the silence out there with its one, wild, incessant noise.  Gurgling and dribbling, hissing and whispering, telling stories to itself about the things we do here and what we are.  The rain is only rain, knows only rain, itself, does not fathom me, does not understand who we are, what we do, does not like much the things it sees us do.  Rain is rain and whispers harsh disapproving remarks, mutters to itself, condemns. 

Rain is life for trees and birds, insects and earth, even for me.  It fills the tank, it fills the river.  It floods.  Not here — but it does flood.  Not here.  I tell my friend, and my children who live far — no, it isn't here, the flood.  We're safe, it's otherwhere.  It's over in the west, and south of here.  We're safe.  The rain mutters, mocks, coming down continuously.  The rain is silver, looks like mud, not clear.  It gets to the ground and spreads out in mud.  It gets to the ground and swells the rivers, spreads all over the land.  No, not here.  We're safe.  Please, let us be safe, we don't want a flood.  We want the drink of the earth, the soaking in, the good rain the birds love.

Afterwards they were all out singing, the rain that rang on Wellington Street when I was a child once.  Afterwards the garden hung with drops, and all the birds out in the light, singing.  Drips from pink roses, drips from bushes and leaves, tangles of thorns, water and birdsong falling all over pink roses, the sun just coming out.  It was not Wellington, it was Brisbane Street.  No matter ... all the gone gardens in the summers of my lost youth.  All the wintry rainy seasons.  The church bell chiming through rain.  I must go home again.  I'll never go home again.  It washes me away, the rain.  I can't go home again.  The rain came tumbling down.

Published in Secret Leopard. Paris, Alyscamps Press, 2005. (See sidebar.)

(A friend asked if she could read some of my prose poems online. So I thought I'd better post some. See also previous post.)

Submitted for dverse Open Link Night #85