Rain Bath Poem by Ijanric Howe

It wraps about the house and clings
Like a wall of wasps with a thousand stings.
Enough to drive you mad,
Or, in sadness, to the drink;
To the numbness and the stink
Of sweat and dirt. You drink
Too heavy and let it drip your chin.
The dirt is cracked and blackened clay
Like a dead limb
Floating away.

The grey grass and blackened trees
Choke the air and squeeze the breeze.
The cruel rain bath stands in mourning;
No mouth to laugh or give warning.
Where death floats still
That couldn’t escape the water’s will.
The pool will never blink,
Like a serpent’s eye
It bides its time,
Pretends to drink
Before it sinks in its fangs
And lets death sink
To rot in its gut.

The fur’s the first to lift
In sodden lumps to surface drift,
And I, inquisitive, begin to sift,
If only to assist
The lifeless and deceased.