A storm, brewing on the
horizon. That’s what they say,
but this storm seems to
be brewing across and around
the entire sky moving and
growing and threatening to
overcome the relatively calm
patch of sky directly above
me. Lightning strikes far
enough in the distance that
the corresponding thunder
is silence behind the clamor
of traffic all around. Yet
it too surrounds me, flashes
out its warning, claims to
be approaching or otherwise
menacing without ever leaving
the furthest corner of my eye.
The air itself rushes back
and forth and all around me,
giving notion of desperate
destinations for plastic sacks
and dry leaves seeking shelter
from the enclosing gloominess.
Pages practically pulled
plainly from my hands, chasing
the wind after its own
imagined fancies, forgetting
the planned purpose for them
was to capture that very magic.
I breathe a subtle perfume,
hidden on the underneaths
and folded corners of the
city smells – exhausted
fumes carrying lightest
fragrant proof of life and
health in this oft-desert
not just of the senses:
that familiar scent that means
rain. I see it coming
down at the edge of the
sky. Purple clouds blurred
as though stretched and
pulled vertically to the earth
giving new depth to redder
clouds absorbing and relaying
the diminishing rays of a
hidden sunset, together
creating a once-in-a-lifetime
color that no brush can
reproduce and my memory
can do no justice, rain
falling before clouds glowing
before sunset unseen.
Night falling too, taking with
it the distinction between storms,
between clouds, between here
and there. Darkness now
punctuated not by breathtaking
blues and reds and flying and
flitting objects in the wind,
but by light bursting
up and down in and out
behind clouds so fast you
cannot turn to see it,
you can only see it by
staying still: motion so fast
it can only be matched
by stillness equally fast.
