Imaginations from a Rain Storm

Rain droplets are spattered over the windowpanes of my back porch, polka-dotting the gray skies behind them. The trees look extra green today. Wet vines cling extra closely to their lattices and brick wall beds. The rain-kissed air sneaks through the cracks of the damp wood and old ventilation systems, and smells greener and cleaner than usual, as if the earth has just stepped out of a bath, perfumed in fresh soil, and wrapped in flat gray clouds.

I watch as a mosquito dances on the windowpane in the upper right corner, fruitlessly fighting for its way out. Its legs are intricate and hard to follow. They remind me of fingers plucking a banjo. Outside, the birds tweet a lively tune and flap like fiddles, flitting between trees and telephone poles. The glistening wet roadways hum and splish methodically with every passing car. The soil taps out a pattering mellow line, as the droplets sink into its pores. Back doors ajar creek rhythmically in the morning breeze, and the wind is a harmonica tune, whistling through open windows, shivering on the sills, and ruffling damp curtains, in sweeping notes - nature’s own bluegrass band.

By the sound of the music, I am whisked away…

To a cozy back porch in the country. I detect the faint smell of maple and blueberries, drifting from a yellow light in the kitchen, and the sweet smokey wood burning in the distant yard, as the rain plays a soothing rhythm on the tin roof…

To a soft, far-off meadow. Tall grasses and wildflowers sway mightily in the wind that delivers scents of subtle herbs and fresh heather. Heaps of storm clouds swirl above, yellow with fervor, ready to burst through the humid air…

To a cool alpine mountain. Thick white fog ascends through the tops of majestic firs and dark pines. The frozen precipitation blankets the world in quiet and ignites the natural smells of the deep rich forest. Juniper runs through my nostrils as I suck in cold raw air under the dusky velvet sky…

To a lively, enchanting brook. My bare feet pad softly over beds of vibrant green moss that lead me to their coy, babbling life source that patters thinly over flat stones and shiny logs. Patches of lilies line the stream, leaves freshened, and colors brightened by the fast-falling droplets. I marvel at how the soft petals stand up against the heavy pin-pricks falling all the way from the sky, and I’m sure that fairies must live here…

…

As my mind drifts back to the serenity of my own back porch, splotchy raindrops turn to soft, steady showers, baptizing the earth in clean new waters that rush down, pool up, and wash away. It is not a threatening rain. There is no thunder or darkness. It is a kind rain, a warm and refining rain, that streams down gullies and sidewalks, and cleans man's prints away.

…

This time I imagine transforming into one of those innumerable rain drops in the soft shower. The rain might fill me up, and wash me away, until my eyes ran into my skin, and my skin ran into the downpour, and I became a rainbow of watercolors, melting in the flood, distorted, abstract, and free. 

As a raindrop, I would run through the ground, and seep into the soil. I’d be drunk into the roots of my favorite trees, where I’d be pulled up their centers, circulated through their vascular webs, and spread into their leaves. There I’d become a part of a flower, and I could feel the sun photosynthesize me, and bud me into petals. And the bees would pollinate me, so I could be a part of a whole garden.

Then I could fall away from my branch, and soar on the wind, and for just a moment, I’d do what birds do. I’d see the sun so closely and taste the freshness of the sky, and journey among the clouds, marveling at the earth from up so high. Then maybe I’d fall, fall, fall through the sky, to rest among the crumpled leaves, having breathed my last beautiful breath, as I lie to die a fragrant and colorful autumn death. 

As I decomposed in the rich soil, I might be swept away by the cold, dark rains of winter. Maybe I’d fall again one day in the form of snow, or hibernate frozen in a cloud. There I’d stay until the next spring, when I would make my warm pattering journey back to the earth that would be once again awake and alive, budding fresh blooms, swaying wildflowers in the winds, and taking refreshing rain baths in that harmonious bluegrass rhythm.