Blessings of the Rain

Sitting at the table, reading something, can't remember what, but does it matter?  No, what matters is the sound of the rain, that soft sizzle of drops on pavement interrupted by the slow sound of torn wrapping paper as a car drives down the street.  Funny how a sound, a moment can be a life saver, give you focus pull you out of the grips of whatever it was what had its claws wrapped around your ankles and dragging down into the deep.

Thank God or Allah or Yahweh or Krishna or Buddha (in no particular order) for that, for the simple gift of rain on a lonely midweek night.  Another one in a long string of lonely ones.  But hey, stop that, cut it out right now, yeah?  Weren't thanks just offered for the rain?  Yes, they were, of course, because the rain is beautiful when it falls like that: just enough to give life without washing everything out in a flood.

Looking out the window into the diamond-studded dark on the streets, the glints and twinkles of sodium glare and headlights coruscating down the street.  The headlights bring hope, but the taillights, well, the taillights always seem kind of sad.  Something getting away, leaving, moving on.  And there has been too much of that.

But the rain sound, it grounds the soul, and maybe the rain puts a damper on things...but the soul sometimes seems born of the rain of love.  The soul knows this, it responds to love like a desert wildflower in a gullywasher.  Bloom, baby, bloom, soak in that life-giving water and bloom while you can.  Sink the roots, grow the leaves and flower as you will.

Whether that be for a night, a month or once in a lifetime...bloom.

The walls of the house filter out a lot of the noise, mute the sounds, soften them like Miles Davis on "Kind of Blue".  Music and rain, the good metaphors for the feelings, the awakening that once lived here.  The awakening like God coming back to a long-abandoned chapel set alone in a far-away field.  God in the chapel,  and in the heart of the lucky passing herdsman who took refuge in the dust and decay to get out of the raging storm.

This was love.  This is what the heart knew, blazing brilliant, turning the rain to steam as it fell.  Now, the sound of the rain is the memory of love gone on walkabout.  The sound of the rain on the pavement brings a weary sigh and a knowing smile, small on a mouth still aching under phantom kisses that once were real.

The mouth smiles, and for once the lips don't tremble, fighting back tears.  It smiles, and whispers a small prayer of thanks to the rain, for allowing remembrance of past fortune...and hope for future joy.

The rain, it is a blessing.