Three Kinds Of Rain

Rain smudged view of a fence top, photo taken from inside car

Rain today, two main kinds.

Heavy: each drop has a discernible weight, the drops are close together.

Light: the water barely felt. Drops fall sparsely and, where acknowledged, are perceived as a change in temperature as they touch the skin.

Until you are wet the air is warm, a summer vestige. Leaves burnish, fruit drops. Blight flourishes - we watch for it, harvest, cut back, holding onto bounty; basil, tomatoes, cucumbers, physalis, aubergines, samphire. This year the lime tree has not blossomed, it may need a new pot. We’re ticking over here, though, not rushing to mend. Make do will do. Our minds champ to be on the land we will buy. Patience, the rain says. It brings the word from the sky, from the sea, from millennia of water cycles. Uh-huh, we say. We can breathe this day’s air, watch our crops, brew and chop and fill the freezer. We are here in this moment but can’t stop the fear or the thrill or the gnashing of ideas - the future that is coming, we want to meet it - the rain is laughing, of course, it knows these words too. Night. I’m driving home from work. The weather is a rain-fog, a whole cloud dropped to earth.

Steep hill top viewed through wet window

Comments

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