Rain, rain, stay a while

Rain, rain, please stay a while. 

The season’s veneer is baked on thick under the stifling sun, hot to the touch and unyielding. I struggle to remember what these surroundings used to look like when the sun was less emboldened. This fluorescent kind of beauty is starting to hurt my eyes. Blinking without rhythm, they well up, scrubbing away the sting. Beneath my soles, the pavement is starting to crack under the pressure. The canopy of leaves in the park is petrified without a stormy breath to shake it back into full being.

Rain, rain, do not hold it back any longer.

I am your willing handkerchief, a canvas for your aged rivulets. I know your melancholic brew has been tucked away in steely pockets for much too long. 

Those swelling fists full of clouds above no longer look menacing to me. The sudden bloom of umbrellas, the chorus of soggy pitter-patters as people seek cover, it’s all just background chatter.

Rain, rain, do not forget your illuminating powers.

Silent are the tender plants that flourish beneath your merciful touch. Colored with joy and sprinkled with sadness, they swell much fuller with life. How beautifully complicated and true they seem after they commiserate with you. 

Rain, rain, lay yourself bare. Let me cup just a few of your parachuting cells. Hand in hand we’ll walk through the gray swells and pooling paths. Conversing with you, I know I will start to shiver. Beneath my skin your drops will fall, between my toes they will start to converge. Heavy my step will become, but the slower I tread, the more I see. You do not flourish in the absence of light. Your messy puddles and deep divots into the earth mark the path that the light follows.

Rain, rain, your echoing growls may scare me sometimes, but I don’t want to twirl a flamboyant shield above my head nor pitter patter anymore. 

Our friendship is new and tenuous, but our connection is complicated and true.

Rain, rain, please stay with me for just a little while longer.