Kay required me to be still

hard as it was when I was little

be still and listen when it rained

and hear it in the trees,

bending the leaves,

darting off the cars.

Making a  soft splat on the sidewalk

And sussurance  in the grass.

Not just the ordinance of thunder

but the tremors in the distance

The murmur of the high wind.

The sounds were a tent

The sky the proscenium

Random, unpredictable

My head on her lap.

 

I bought a home by  a little creek

languid most days

but storms made it drunk

it filled and toppled it banks

stumbling, raging into the house

breaking furniture, loss

and scars of mold

abuse

 

After each storm became an uncertainty,

rain a neuroses

Kay died as I was selling the house

before we could move on

Now I lay in bed and listen to drops on the roof

and try to remember