Wheeling

Round and round your gliding goes

In the slanting light of the afternoon.

Above the roads’ right-angled rows

You fly with wings outstretched, in tune

With every current of flowing air

To spin in spirals drawn with care.

What unseen tether leads you on,

Wheeling round and round, until

A few light flaps mean you are gone

To find some other space to fill

With feathered grace where the weather’s fair

To write your course which angels share?

I wrote this last weekend as I was sitting on my balcony, watching birds glide in slow circles. It's something I see often, and the gracefulness of the motion always makes me stop and take notice. I feel pretty fortunate to be able to see their aerial dance from such a good vantage point on the top floor of my building - often they are flying at, or even just below, eye level.

Walking through Rain

It was just a drizzle when I left

And had nearly ended when I arrived,

But in between, the clouds were cleft

In two, and every surface thrived,

Enlivened by the drumbeat of

The pouring rain from up above.

Puddles grew to a rippling pool,

While little rivers formed to rule

The roads where they were running.

Most people paused beneath a tree,

And they, perhaps, were far more cunning

Than I would prove myself to be,

My sneakers sopping wet despite

The little umbrella perched above my head.

I must have been a disheveled sight,

Pressing on through what the clouds had shed,

But as I reached my journey’s end,

The rain was slowing up ahead,

And soon it stopped. The drops that did descend

Were dripping just from me.

Although I’d hoped to avoid rain’s fall

While walking home, I find I’m free

Of anger toward the timing of it all.

I’m covered, drenched, but something’s there

Within the molecules that share

Their bonds with me,

Supporting life across eternity.

 

For a couple weeks, I've been teasing the fact that I've gotten caught in a couple cloudbursts while walking home. This poem is about one of those instances. I left the office, seeing that it looked like it might start raining soon and hoping I could get home before it began, thinking that the rain might last a while. Instead, a downpour commenced almost as soon as I had stepped outside, and continued until just before I reached the gate of my apartment building, when it slowed and then stopped. So, it turned out that I had picked the worst possible time to go, except for the fact that I ended up not really minding being drenched by the end of it all.

Sheets of Rain

Why does rain come down in sheets?

It’s not a blanket warming those beneath,

Nor, I think, a page of written word,

But maybe one for music, which I’ve heard

In drizzle’s calm and thunder’s gnashing teeth.

Each droplet draws a note when ground it meets.

 

This week's poem is a short one, continuing the rain theme from last week since it has still been raining quite a bit here in Nairobi. (I got caught outside in another cloudburst this past week, and had left my umbrella at home...) Essentially, this poem is just having a little fun with the phrase "sheets of rain" - taking it, perhaps, a bit too literally. I'll also note the rhyming structure in this one, which might be a bit unorthodox, but I kind of like it: It's symmetrical, with the last three lines mirroring the first three.

A Storm Before

Streams of water tumble down

From clouds that nearly touch the ground,

Appearing like a pale-gray gown

That shrouds the air, and rhythm’s found

Within the rumble of the hail

Which pounds below, while thunder drums on high.

The storming slows. Light thins the veil.

Remaining droplets hanging from the rail

Are lenses toward a distant bright blue sky,

Prefiguring what peace will follow nigh.

 

It's been raining pretty frequently here - it often doesn't last very long, but it can get pretty hard while it is raining. I was actually caught in a brief cloudburst as I was walking home a few days ago - I've started a poem about that, but it's not done yet. The poem here is about an afternoon storm from a couple weeks ago - it came and went quickly, and then the sun began to come out afterward. 

Spiral Ascending

Somebody’s knocking

On the door I’m unlocking

As rain droplets drum overhead.

Who could be standing

On the edge of my landing

To wake me so early from bed?

The door opens wide,

And the stairwell is dyed

With a shadow of somebody waiting,

But that presence moved on,

Ever higher it’s gone

Toward the clouds and the storms they’re creating.

I follow its track

Never once looking back

Up the steps in a spiral ascending.

Upon reaching the top

On the roof, I stop,

Anointed by raindrops descending.

But no one is here,

Though I thought it was clear

That someone before me was leading.

I feel something around me.

Its essence confounds me,

Then it dissipates, slowly receding

Unknown and unseen as the storms disappear.

With the dawn comes the calm I’ve been needing.

 

My apartment in Nairobi is on the ninth and final floor of the building, and although there is an elevator, I often take the stairs up and down for the exercise. Nairobi is over a mile above sea level, and climbing up nine flights of stairs certainly gets the blood pumping. The stairway continues up after the ninth floor, ending on the roof, where a lot of people hang their laundry to dry. This poem is simply an imagined and somewhat magical event, in which I hear someone on the stairway, follow them to the roof, but then whoever it was is gone.