Days of Rain

 

Days of rain close in spaces

Shrink them beyond recognition

Glaze them with damp water colors

and translucent light. 

 

Water soaks deep into the earth,

Ponds around pines, oaks, and maples,

Washes away their fibrous underground grip,

Targets the tallest, oldest trees,

Fells their crowns,

Upends their root circles.

 

Long, loosened threads sway in the air,

Thin, string fringes swing

From hoisted mud clods,

Caked around broken, thick roots,

leaving craters filled with muddy water.

 

Fallen trunks and their large branches

Scatter the low light that travels close to the ground

As tree canopies open to the sound of their swan songs

For a brief illusion of light before the deep

Fog rolls in and closes in the spaces

Among the trees and along the surface

of the earth, shaken.

 

Waiting for the passage of too many heavy clouds

And the slow return of the sun that can shed light

On the vines and saplings that will obscure

The oldest and the tallest trees, brought down to earth

by days of rain.

 

 

©cmheuer, April, 2021