I know I should be going. I promised myself I would go to work early. Then, it started raining. The morning still dark, another cup of coffee, another few minutes to enjoy the rain gently licking against the window panes of my small place.
My room is lit with a few lamps; light hovering in dark pockets of the room creating an even cozier ambience. I could stay in this spot all day and write. Stephen King does most of his writing in a small corner of the attic in his New England Home. He says having no distractions is a way to focus. I would have to add a window or two, Steve. Viewing the tree branches outside a window and on days like this, seeing the effects of the rain would be a added dimension to my writing, not a distraction.
What is it about rain and being indoors that feels so comforting? What is so appealing about this visceral experience? Does it still us in such away that the desire to stay inside also is a desire to go inside ourselves?
Do we want to climb back into the womb and feel the comfort of being surrounded by water and darkness? Is it primal or learned or just appealing because of the auditory sounds of liquid drops splashing up against the outside of our domains?
For me, it feels like a beautiful place to go inward. I almost want to make it a spiritual experience, a cleansing of the crooks and crannies of thoughts and stress and worries I haven’t taken the time to sweep out. I feel the calmness of rain fill me up.
It always feels like a gift.
Here is a gift for you DS. Happy Birthday. I hope the weather doesn’t dampen your special day!
RAIN
It washes my soul
Cleanses my brain from
Any thought that steals
My peace.
I love the sound of it,
Softly falling on the street
Outside my window,
Small crystals tinkling
As they crash.
Butter drops on the leaves of bushes;
Fat round drops that
Shine the waxy broad leaf bright.
Drops so soft they
Feel like velvet and
Cushion a deep part of
My fractured day.
These fairy drops
Replenish the earth
With dewy moistness
While we sleep,
And only a trace of
Their steps
Does morning show:
Damp earth,
Spotted ground,
And fog rising up
As melted rain.
I shade my hand to splitting sun
driving way The clouds,
And pray the bolts
Of cotton gray will tumble
yet again
And wash some peace my way.
Vikki Yeary January 5, 1997
