After so many days of clear, perfect blue skies, it’s raining here this morning.  I hope this means the fire ridden areas of this province will also get some as the weather moves east.  It would be an answer to prayer.  But the sound, the freshness of rain in the summer has a quality that charges it full of memory, even when it isn’t so desperately needed.

This poem I wrote a few weeks ago, when a little rain on a hot day stirred up that familiar scent that only happens under those circumstances.  I have been waiting weeks for some rain to fall again so I can post it.

Summer Rain

The scent of summer rain
sends me racing raindrops,
polka-dotting the asphalt,
astride my very orange bike,
pulling hard on high handlebars,
standing to pump the pedals, ignoring
the sparkled banana seat to stay ahead.

Thunder announces the race,
‘neck and neck’ as I count only
one  two, and – Flash!

Flying now, I’m almost home,
bare arms, tanned and dusty,
snaked by wet clingy streaks
and lungs exercised. I am full
of that musty sweet satisfaction,
aerosoled into the air by cheering drops
showered onto a summer warmed earth
and a girl, exhilarated – belonging
to that yesterday, but also to today,
as I link arms with her to make
one long summer-day memory.

© 2017 – Laurel Archer