Rain Poem by Ronald Baatz

RAIN FOR THE SEEDS, KNIFE FOR THE MOLD

More rain. I don't play any music, instead I listen
to the rain in the open window. Even the sound of it
falling on the air-conditioner doesn't bother me.
Earlier this evening the young woman from #10
came for a visit, staying until it was time for sleep.
She likes to sit on the couch, nibble on toast, drink tea.
She has cancer, is not expected to live much longer.
When she puts her arms around her bones feel
like a dilapidated picket fence pressing into me.
Since I know she has not long to live I try not to
bore her, but more often than not I fail miserably.
For the entire time she spent with me she sat
on the couch in dim light, listening to the rain,
nibbling on a piece of toast turned black from
my broken toaster. She had brought the bread
with her in a small pocketbook containing, also, the
the clove cigarettes I have to keep buying for her.
What's left of her pale whiteness smells from cloves.
I told her about my father's plans for his garden.
Her response was to say that when summer comes
she too wouldn't mind spending time in a garden.
I didn't question her about the details. I didn't want
to bore her with the plodding ordeal of small talk.
While walking her back across the parking lot,
close to midnight, under black umbrella,
I realized that I had repeatedly mentioned
the fact that the rain would be good for the seeds
I had raked into the scraggly lawn of the motel.
She had paid little attention to what I said, however.
And, seriously, there was no sense in worrying about
having bored her. Perhaps it's impossible to bore
the dying, so completely bored are they already.
As I'm taking my clothes off to get into bed
it's still raining. A coldness is coming through
the window facing the stream that runs
out back of the motel. Standing there
naked as a fish, except for the underpants
taken from Murray's room after he died,
I'm cold but refuse to close the window.
Instead I unzip my sleeping bag and
throw it over the blanket on the bed.
I don't think she had heard a word I said.
Before toasting the bread she had
brought with her, I had to cut off
patches of mold.
Rain for the seeds,
Knife for the mold.

Woodstock/1987