Rain falls when
The clouds get heavy. I
Walk with my umbrella, which the wind turned
Inside out. Droplets fall around
My head, and I
Remember when I was a child and got
To play in the puddles. Then I became sick
And cuddled in blankets. Mother puts a hand to
My forehead and smiles at my
Sneeze. I drink hot soup, which warms my stomach.
Now I wetly plod along, and
My soul smiles as I
Recall the rubber ball that I threw
So high it seemed to touch the rainbow that arced down.

Several times in my life I have had the strange sensation that I might just fall up into the sky at any given moment.  Like gravity would, for some reason, simply stop affecting me.

It happened once when I was seven, laying on my back in the summer grass, cloud-watching.

It happened again, when I was seventeen, while I was staring at the stars reflected in the water.

And once just now
when I thought about
you loving me.

1.
Remember the puppet that you were

who thought himself
a real boy
still only just a boy

remember
like perusal of hate mail
        their postal telepathy
as though flipping through cellophane
photo albums of many nameless
faces

distant / detached / unmarred

Remember how you had
not known them then
                 floating on airs
ignorant  / clueless / willful
still constantly fair

like May flowers
in pebbled gardens

Self sacrificed fool
still only just a boy
and like all in their youth
selfishly optimistic
        a wide bellow
for the wide world
and untoward
night

Yet this life / its tangled strings
(tug & pulling)
with Geppetto's fermented footing

precariously
curious and nimble

such as
and / that boy was
quite...
           agreeable to a fault

happy to oblige a fly

But something else
also had its gravity
(pride for tiger stripes)
taunt
there within : an invisible string

to keep true
be mindful
be cool
(nimble thimbles cool)
searching  but not so...

"you will know when you find it
you, a perpetual student"

open
as pouring rain
always in awe of it
                                  all
dismissive of the drowning
barely afloat in city-scape

And now a real boy
living / colors / the lessons
of life  
            a dance  
     (Kick ball change)

carrying its rhythmic weight with
a style & a smile
always in all ways / in awe

Boy refusing to grow up
who's dreams are tall
Inside a lotus waits to open

Brown Eyes
         like quiet ripples

A dragonfly
on the pond

in our pebbled garden.


2.
Smooth stones
pave a path for bare feet
there's no use or need for dirt
on our way toward
peace.

no ripples on the pond
dragonfly wings - like glass...
clear of mind
tend to the life and health of our garden
that is the duty of Earth's wardens
a light to shed the night...

although the lotus may bloom
out of season, arriving late,
it is the wisest of all flora
knows to wait for the rain,

so here we are late bloomer
Lion of the southern gate of Maan,
looking for you ...

The circumference of every pond
is only valued by how deep
it quenches
the thirst those who drink...

my hands are empty
and what falls from heaven I will cup
that's my gift, overflowing, honest, open
Falling
up.