Washed

The sky today looked like cotton dipped in liquid coal. I walked home slowly as the smell of waiting rain gathered between the ground and sky. I sat in bed to work. There was a soft pitter patter, like horses in the distance. I opened my door and watched as the wood on my porch darkened under the weight of new water.

Dust turns to cement as rain plops down. You run your finger over a car, banister, or railing and you get a glue that you can use to cement your other rained out memories to the one you're making now. No one speaks. Birds only whisper. The water has the floor and it always says the say thing, only its volume changes. Soft, the little pitter-pat of drops wandering down to the ground, loud smacks as the rain is spit from the sky.

Water can sprinkle onto a bare forearm. It can sit, more welcome than sweat, reminding you that your skin is breathing. It can wander down your arm, past and through invisible hair, leaving a rumor of goosebumps in its cool trail. It can drift down to the ends of your empty hands, hanging onto lonely fingers, never wanting do crash down to the ground. This is the company nature gives.

The mist and clouds and fog and rain and dew wash the grass and roads. Why should your skin seek better? Congealing in the early morning on mailboxes and bicycle seats, reminding us in the quietest hours that we are not as lonely as we think. It is there. It is waiting. It will condense and clean our filthy skin.