I didn't post a poem last week, but I'm back today with a poem about rain. It's been raining every night here in Haiti - way too early for the rainy season. Everyone keeps saying, "Wow, isn't it good that it didn't rain like this last year?" There are still many people living in tents and in less than adequate shelter, but nothing like the millions who were sleeping outdoors last February. In French they use the expression à la belle étoile - under the beautiful stars - to talk about sleeping outside. Sounds lovely, doesn't it? The reality is somewhat different. Here's what I posted on February 11th, 2010, the first time it rained after the earthquake.
Today's rain poem has the perfect attitude towards the rain.
Before the Rain
by Lianne Spidel
Minutes before the rain begins
I always waken, listening
to the world hold its breath,
as if a phone had rung once in a far
room or a door had creaked
in the darkness.
Perhaps the genes of some forebear
startle in me, some tribal warrior
keeping watch on a crag beside a loch,
miserable in the cold...
Here's the rest of it.
And here's today's Poetry Friday roundup.
4 hours ago
1 comment:
"under the beautiful stars" is positively idyllic. I've always loved our English phrase "sleeping under the stars" for outdoor sleeps but as usual The French have us out romanticized.
That poem is beautiful. I often find myself thinking when I am trying to keep a child quiet in public about the Jewish mothers who tried to keep their children silent when they were in hiding during WWII. Potent feeling, that.
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