It rained today. Outside the window, the rush of cars and wind and people running across streets yelling, the translucent darkness of the night seeping past the sliver of curtains. During the day, the air cold and crisp and gray: rain-slick pavement, rustling trees with darkened bark, wet leaves half-decomposed, mottled, pressed flat against the concrete. Strikingly beautiful, almost startling so. Has it always been this way, the groups of people laughing, their faces flushed with cold, the blooming flowers, the air fresh and languid and clean. Boots with shiny leather. Cold hands. Shoes soaked, hems damp, numb feet. Has it always been this way — the beauty of it all, of this, of everything. Red lights at dusk. Silvery puddles reflecting iridescent fragments of sky. During the day, the windows clear, misted over with raindrops: the pale light, the washed-out buildings, the dark outline of trees. The white sky, sunless. The glutinous wisps of skinny clouds. The sound of rain against glass. On the streets: girls in short leather skirts, their legs long and delicate and bare. Old women in puffy jackets. Children splashing in puddles. Don’t run, you’ll slip. Then: I told you to be careful! Blades of grass, thin, translucent like jade, bent and speckled with dew. Plastic cups of coffee half-drank, stippled with condensation. Labels completely soaked through, grayish with water, soft, the corners half-peeled and bunched into knots. How have I never noticed this before, the dark leaves like lace doilies, the coarse bark, the birds with glossy round eyes. Fluorescent lighting of the subway. Hard plastic seats. People hunched over their phones, screens smeared with fingerprints, jackets blotched with raindrops. Quick tapping fingers. Faces colorless in the light, pallid, some impassive, some laughing: eyes flickering, cheeks bunched up, teeth yellow and bared. Doors open: rush of wind, fading conversation, clouds of perfume. There’s no way he — I swear! Where do you want to get dinner? There’s a new place that just opened up down the street, I’ve always wanted to try —
Inside, hot water, yellow lights, mirror clouded over with steam. Silky soap swirling down the drain. Soft towel. Skin smooth, hot, dry. Clean clothes. Damp hair on cool sheets. Cold, filtered water dripping down my chin. The broad, almost plastic-looking leaves of my house plant, shiny and dark green. Streetlights outside, slightly blurred, softly shining red, orange, yellow. On my tablet: pictures of forests, knotted trees, sprawling fields of moss, everything bluish-green. Quiet, still. Books with thin, inky fonts, the g’s and d’s written just the way I like. Somehow gratifying everything is, this moment, perfect. Poems: tonight he is alive and in the north field with his mother, if the dog were alive he would be drowning, in the spring the rabbits will find it and build their nest inside. The living go on living, and the dead go on living with them. The rain seeps in the cracks, and the trunk falls to the ground, and the moss covers it. Nothing is wasted in nature or in love. Opened windows. Whirring of cars outside. Soon, the lights will be off and blankets will be drawn in and tomorrow will begin. Tomorrow: what it will bring, no one can say for sure. But today was beautiful, it was. It was.
annaxmalina
turnnoffyourmind
jacobvanloon
titsay
prguitarman
