Rain by kj

[cameron]

A mid-sized freighter ploughing past the point in heavy rain;
grey mist and more grey mist and heavy rain;
lights on the Lions’ Gate Bridge,

trees in a faint wind and a dull, heavy green,
grey mist and more grey mist and heavy rain;
lights on the Lions’ Gate Bridge.

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Rain all day long;
up your nostrils the blooming blue smell of rain;
rain thick as putty in your hand;
rain like gel on your windscreen;
rain torrenting off tarmac;
rain in the middle of the night like a tambourine;
rain in the dreams of the city,
city in a dream of rain.

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I like when rain from leakybaglike sky come down, to dampen wheels of cars and bicycles. Underbrella, people spinning round, like one-year olds when lights at once extingle. When rain, I watch, feel its gentleness on my face, arms. Sidewalk-filth goback, dogfur shaking side a side.

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Afternoon of unobtrusive rain /
unobtrusive afternoon of rain /
root ginger and closed cup mushrooms and red onions outside the grocery /
the rain falling andante on the canopy /
cars parked up at the White Spot in the rain /
rain unvarying /
afternoon intersecting with evening.

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Today’s rain bringeth forth - not desert flowers,
but a geriatric peddling brollies,
shoppers like bedraggled border collies,
American gents in bars with whiskey-sours.

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A head-hit, a high of mine, unevaluateable, lucent, gelid, makes-you-feel-okay, turns roads into rivers, turns stone into soap, turns soap into foam, makes rivers run, makes people complain, you sing in it, some claim it has rhythm, washes these streets, brings forth an efflorescence of umbrellas, blooming like desert flowers, or a horde of fungi ripe for plucking, spawns frogs, newts, and other cute amphibs, bounces, flounces, trounces burdens and cares, floats boats, rattles guttering, sounds like gravel, tipples, ripples, yawls and growls and howls like cats and dogs, swells the sky, breaks levees, rumbles, rolls, renovates, fills in holes, rinses infestations, turns worms, renews affections, by turns longed-for and abhorred, exalted, feared, adored, like love,

a love-letter from above.

What desert people dream of.

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The sky is like a rinsed-out barbecue
upturned and drizzling grits across the lawn;
the sun is sputtering like a Davy lamp
in the leaky lower levels of a mine.

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When we wake up, next door’s dog is howling, and the orange sun hangs under the cloudline like a lantern from a black beam. Everything is drenched. We must prune the moonflowers, lest grandmother’s delirium come on again.