Showers

I miss rain. Southern California is a beautiful part of the country, but it's days like these that I miss the sound of precipitation pounding on the roof--a sudden summer storm followed by a sun that steams the streets.
I went home last month to Arkansas, and it did in fact rain, but not a daytime, humidity-raising rain; it was a midnight blast of thunder, lightning, and fat drops that roll awkwardly down your face on impact. I was glad to be in it. I had almost forgotten what real rain feels like...without a mudslide rolling down after it, that is.

Showers

I crouch down low and shut my eyes,
Listening to liquid gravity;
Water diving, sliding, hitting the ground
With a plink. It is delicious.

I inspect my arms and am pleased
To feel like a child again,
Pretending the droplets there are
Warts instead, or beads
Of Elmer’s ready for peeling.

I stand again and think of how I’m
Ruining a winter’s worth of moisturizing.
I do not care; I tilt my head
And watch the water flow down
The strings of my hair: they swell
At the ends like a belly breathing.

And the liquid pins prick at my back,
Prodding me to envy:
I should have been a pail of water
Thrown emphatically onto the floors of silent seas.

Sighing, I answer, finally, that voice
Nagging of sky-high water bills and droughts:
I turn it off and reach for a towel,
Resolving in my heart to remember
To forget my umbrella,
On our next trip home.

©June 2003