iy47ab (01/22/83)
Elegy for Rain
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She had been born in a time
where there were no flowers. The rain
cascading down on the angry asphalt
followed her mother's shivers
down the long, antiseptic hallway
to the white chamber where she drew
her first breath. Going home,
the rain echoed on the roof,
and her mother sighed, drawing her coat
tightly around her. She nestled close
against the April chill.
The flowers came, later of course, but
they came, even as May follows April.
Pressed corsages buried in silk and lace
filled her mind with February valentines
and June weddings. She forgot the rain
as, slowly by slowly, the flowers remembered her.
Green lawns melted their way towards July;
she ran laughing through fields of golden
August, and touched September trees
with October-tipped fingers.
Softly, she whispered into November sunsets
the cadences of her love
in voices like December chrysanthemums.
January heard.
In the calm of one April afternoon,
her mother fell softly and did not arise
again. Shrouded in tears, she placed
the worn body in its mahogany case and
stowed it carefully beneath the warm, soft earth.
She heaped the flowers gently over the low mound.
Wandering home at sunset, she felt the rain begin.
V.P. l982
For Arlene; and now, for Sherry.