Highway Rain
Arizona has a love affair with water.
The desert looks almost out of place in
the rain,
it's not accustomed to touch.
Twigs and bark bristle against the slow
coup d’état of clouds.
Saguaros stand taller, in challenge, gripping
to baked dust.
No one ever told you why -rain is so
special here.
It wasn't until you saw the lightening
rod place
it’s finger again and again, until you
noticed the smell - creosote,
or how all the plants rise up a body
rises into a back bend,
or like your hair when déjà vu brushes
your neck…
until you saw how humbly the desert
drank,
never asking the water if there was
someone else,
it wasn't until you noticed the way the
desert hummed
sometimes for days afterward.
It wasn’t until you saw steam rise from
rocks and stray bits of metal,
until you had to pull the car over because
there was nothing but rain.
It was then, stopped halfway between Tucson
and El Paso that you knew.
You could never leave the desert. Might
move away for years,
but you’d always come back. Your devotion
to water
was only made sharper by experiencing
it sparsely.
You learned to ignore the slurs, the
wrong names…
“Empty,” “dried out,” “barren” and
replaced them with “open.”
You learned from the desert, a place rumored
to be lifeless
how to live. Smiled when people ‘didn’t
get it.’ Didn’t see
the beauty in long stretches of sky and
earth.
Some people needed more green and more hills.
And you, you needed more possibilities.
You became a local when you understood
it wasn't the rarity of rain.
It was how frantically the sky and
earth connected.
Weaving curtains of water and electric
bolts between them.
As if shear intensity could counteract
the inconsistency.
Rain in the desert was like a show
down,
like rage turned into sex
and then love making.
Terrifying – Beautiful.
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