Rain

It’s been raining for hours here in south Louisiana. It rained all night, and it’s still raining. Our front lawn is half flooded, with newborn lakes established here and there. At least twenty robins are scattered over this sodden earth, taking advantage, I would guess, of easier access to worms or grubs. The rain hasn’t put a damper to the crowd of American goldfinches that come to our feeders every day. Rain be damned, they’re gobbling away at the fallen seeds on the ground.

Front lawn with robins

When it rains, I feel the world has been cleansed. That we have been given a new chance to get things right. That all the dirt, both real and figurative, has been washed away. When rain falls, I always feel a kind of absolution. It means I can start anew. It's a kind of recurring baptism.

The sound of rain is soothing, a lullaby. No wonder there are tapes of rain falling to help people sleep. The slap of rain on fall leaves stirs the heart. The slant of rain. The need for rain. The comfort of rain.

I have our front door open to it. I can feel the freshness of the rain waft into the room where I’m working and I can smell the freshness as well. The way you can breathe rain even indoors.

Rain can go awry, but it shouldn’t be judged for that. Anything in nature can shift from being benign to dangerous. Yes, there are rains that are not pleasant. I think of cold windy rainy March days in New York City. Or when you're driving at night and the rain is so brutal you can’t see even beyond your windshield and your heart is about to exit your body.

All in all, though, everything about rain is replenishing and poetic. It’s not a coincidence that Ernest Hemingway begins his memoir about Paris, A Moveable Feast, in rainy weather. This is a cold, sad-producing rain, but nevertheless an inspiring rain. He walks from his apartment to the Place St-Michel to a good cafe. He takes off his damp coat, sits down, and writes:

“A girl came in the cafe and sat by herself at a table near the window. She was very pretty with a face fresh as a newly minted coin if they minted coins in smooth flesh with rain-freshened skin.....”

If rain accompanies strong sensual moments, then you live a poem, you’re fully alive. In college, I was in love with a beautiful, melancholy girl. Her name was Sarah. I remember one afternoon, together, in bed. I remember it started to rain. I remember the sound of the rain slapping against the leaves on the ground and the damp smell of it breathing into the window and cooling our bodies. My arm was draped around her bare shoulder. The cascade of her soft hair fell onto my naked arm. I often think about the soft sound of the rain against the windowsill and on the leaves on the ground. Of us in bed together as we talked dreamily to the tat-tat-tat of rain against the leaves.

If we think about the wonders of being alive, so many are simple, straightforward. Rain is one. Replenishing, cleansing, encouraging. Making us poets for at least an hour or so. The beauty of those drops coming from the sky. The mystery of it. There are things in this world that are dark. Rain is not one of them.