When rain comes on, I get up and look out. It is a spectacle, a miracle, a blessing not in wise disguise at all. I hear it first, soft patter as drops hit the leaves of tall green trees, metal of cars, touch every inch of pavement, tarmac, grass. It starts to fall, keeps at it, comes to pass in tiny particles of water. Stars are not so close and local. Watch a patch get wetter by the minute. Rain is certain to draw its grey dense sheet across – curtain of gloom, well known, a gentle pall. I catch one raindrop, bring my arm back in, housebound as drains sound musical, full of that stuff, near vertical, sent down. It eases off. I go back to my book, the whole day crowned by ordinary rain, fleeting, complete. Its course is not competing, falls and flows till ground is drowned, as only nature knows. It comes and goes. It makes me leave my seat like gospel convert, caught up in the word or football fan when well aimed ball goes in or dancer with the answer set to spin quick feet. I want to see what I have heard to witness wetness, sustained pattern, slant, velocity and saturation, get the quality of it, as a poet which goes deep, to the roots of tree and plant, or sonic power to enchant. How rain is not a sprawling symphony of noise, maintains its austere form, its harpist's poise, its stanzas regular. Rain keeps it plain. I want to get up from my seat again.
