It is a midsummer storm, and the air is textured like heavy cream
warm and thick and sweet. It hasn't yet began to rain, and bare toes
grasp clods of dust, the kind with root fibers tangled inside,
and everything is keenly sensed: the smell, the taste, the touch,
the sound of the wind and the warmth in this charged moment.
It is impossible to not be humbled before these grey clouds,
massive structures that remind you of the roiling turbidity of silt
at the bottom of a river, freshly disturbed by a fish's tail
- except these grey giants, these clouds feel infinitely large.
Humbled, yes.
And powerful: the little human on the parched earth
feels vigor pumping through veins,
a feeling typically beyond recollection
that is difficult to trace to its source.
Where is this power flowing from? Not from some
deluded sense that this small mammal could shift
a single bead of moisture in the sky, no;
where is this power flowing to? Its effect is . . . unplanned,
it is spontaneous in nature, even though it feels so rooted
that no-one, certainly not you, could move it.
This power? The source is invisible, the fate uncertain.
The purpose? Take note. This is faith:
to be so confronted by reality that your inner monologue
forgets to stay in a continuous loop; at last, you hear your part
in a greater melody; to concentrate
on something outside the ceiling of your skull.
Reality will only be itself.
Either project your attention outwards to trust the truth,
or blind yourself with anxiety.
The power you feel inside the storm does not belong to you,
it belongs to the Greater Picture. But, the choice is always yours:
hide away, or raise your face. the rain
begins
to fall.
Praise to whom, you ask?
