10th Feb 2020, when the drought broke:
Follow me:
downhill from the
overflowing dam,
clambering over rocks
and fallen trees
to the waterfall place.
Dry for months,
a whole year,
now it flows,
roaring, gushing,
foam collecting
in mounds below.
Scoop up a handful,
and blow:
puff it scattering
into the air.
Keep going down,
follow the gully,
to flatter ground,
where the water spreads,
a shining sheet,
reflecting the trees,
the clouds.
Up the next hill,
and down again.
Come down
to the big gully,
where all the flows gather.
Come into the mud,
at the water’s edge
slick yellow clay,
sliding up
between your toes
as you slide,
laughing,
across it.
Keep going,
keep following,
to the eroded land,
where the water
cascades down
in three falls,
into a thigh deep pool.
Stand below,
let the water run over you,
pummelling and
drenching you,
so you can hardly breathe,
and every breathe
pulls the scent of
earth, leaves,
brown water
inside you.
Until finally,
gasping,
you are sated
with water.
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Rain, rain go away? 🙂 Nope, I don’t think it can ever rain enough. Our average annual rainfall is about 600mm, last year we got less than 400mm. When it finally rained we got more than 100mm in 24 hrs – the dam flooded, the creek rose above the road so the kids couldn’t go to school and I couldn’t go to work (before COVID meant working at home)… so we followed the water.
anotherKate 
Beautiful
Thank you 🙂 I love this poem because of the day it describes, which makes it impossible for me to be objective about it. I think it was the first day I had felt safe and happy in months, because we’d had bushfires close and the dam was dry and the tank almost empty – and then to have so much rain was such a joyous relief.
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