nedful things

The rain has stopped.

For a time there I had forgotten the look of a blue sky, the feel of the sun's warmth on my face.  I had not squinted at a sudden glare assaulting my eyes as I stepped outside in over two weeks.

It started the day my car door wouldn't close.  The door that usually refused to open had given way easily and then decided to lock itself open.  It's hard to say why it does these things. It's something special that Ford built into the car, a certain capriciousness that makes it a series of misadventures to own.  Strangely, although I often resent and fear its gift for practical jokes, overall it is a most fitting vehicle for me. Bits fall off for no apparent reason, doors decide to stay open or shut at will, latches come off in your hand, the key refuses to come out of the ignition, but it starts and runs and does so reliably.  It's a workhorse that amuses itself by displaying eccentricities that keep us on our toes. When I noticed from my office window that it had started to rain, I went out to the parking lot to apply some duct tape to the top and sides of the door.  I had tied it shut but because the latch was stuck in the locked position, there was a space and I didn't want to fill the back seat with water.  Later when I went to have my mechanic spring the latch, the falling rain was steady and soaking.  It never really stopped again for two weeks.

That first week there was every manner of rain: sudden bursts, steady drizzles, winds of fine mist.  In early spring the rain intensifies the color of the newly unfurled leaves and grass, they are a tender green but vibrant, not yet dulled by the sun and droughts of summer.  The leaves of summer become dark and lackluster, but these trees of spring pour every bit of life they can into these newborns.  Flowering bushes burst out in brilliant pinks and purples, a few trees still show white blossoms, the pavement is slick and black.  The effect fills the eyes and overflows the senses with beauty unspeakable.

However after a week or so, my protestations of "I like the rain" and my explanations of its aesthetic qualities were being met with snorts and sneers by coworkers, and to tell the truth, I, myself, was a little tired of being constantly damp. I think even the rain was tired of just being annoyingly predictable, so it changed.

It started on Saturday, the day I had satellite TV being installed.  The rain became heavy and steady, falling in huge drops.  Globs of rain fell like water balloons, striking your forehead and splattering over your face.  It continued throughout the day, soaking the poor man who had to attach the satellite dish to the garage roof, soaking the ground, running down the streets in rivers, making lakes of all low-lying areas.  It continued with that intensity all through the next day as well.  And the next.

It was serious now, this rain.  Rivers overflowed, streets and bridges washed out, schools closed, highways were shut down for stretches of miles in length.  It was raining, still raining, always raining.  The weather report was watched only for the video of impossibly flooded roads and houses.  Tides were high, flood watches were announced near every waterway.  Life became intense and every drive to work a series of detours around roads that were impassable.  

Then, as suddenly as it began, it stopped.  The sun shone and I expected to feel the difference, to have some irresistible feeling come over me and to rise up with renewed hope and life.  That didn't happen.  Life is busy and we tend to notice only those things that hamper us.  In two days the waters had receded enough that schools and roads were reopened and life went back to normal.  It was hardly even noticed that after three short days of sun, it rained again.  

It was only rain, after all.

We gathered
chairs encircled
defensively against grief
quietly fingering memories
as the album changed hands
Your hands changed now
to those that can no longer
hold me
I saw you with your mother
and the circle of mothers' days
and daughters

l heard you
in knowing narrative
of younger and youngest
Voices that sang with love
Voices that broke with pain
Held together by shared stories
of teas in the garden
The dress your mother made
that you straight off
(to adorn your new straw hat)
tore that first wearing
climbing the grape arbor
( you plucked an early flower that
tantalized you from a neighbor's fence)

"One year on Mother's Day"
I excitedly burst in
"I planted flowers for her
 along the walk"

Today we left you in flowers
each dropped a peach of a rose
upon the sheen of mahogany
and each turned to another
bonded firmly to family
formerly distant
now drawn together
We gathered
our chairs encircled
passing memories
each to another
in the circle of
Mothers' days

**This poem was written as a submission for a poetry contest last Mother's Day.  It won first prize**