Canoes And Galoshes Poem by Zoe Nyght

The scent of rain makes me feel like

getting nothing done - just lying all day on my goose feather bed
with pen in hand and the soft rumble at my sill -

thinking back to times like (and nostalgia's taking over)

that one rainy afternoon, when me and my girlfriends
dug up an old canoe from someone's garage and thought we could -silly little things-
ride it down
the slippery hill that connects all our houses.

Needless to say, the road ate up the canoe's wooden bottom;
but that day was drenched in our giggles.

And the scent of rain makes me

want to recapture the days of five year old romping through puddles in new pink
galoshes, but (oh yes I remember now) in a flurry of boots, I tripped and
fell and cried into the street,
scrunching up my face -so tight! - to squeeze out the pain.

Some days, still, I lie on my fluffed down bed and scrunch up my face
weeping into soft pillows, as the heavens spout their sorrows.

And the scent of rain

steals my energy - handing out meager samples of inspiration
instead. It leaves me tired and lightly wondering,
enticed but not fulfilled, damp but wet not through;

And

I always wish I could, just once, hold on to the drops on my tongue.
Lifting my chin to the sky, spreading my arms
wide like in the movies -why do they do that? -
I giggle, I scrunch up my face, I stand here dripping,

as the rain soaks in my patience

rumbling softly, so softly,
and intense.



[October 19th,2004]