Spring is well underway, and with it the twin delights of warm sun and easy-falling rain. In just a few weeks, balmy summer arrives. Here’s a poem about our seasonal and still-available childlike pleasures.

  

                     An  Invitation

There’s a rain arriving from the mysterious west                    

it will patter against the dog-faced mimosa leaves

stream down along the asphalt shingles            

splash into your wide and upturned mouth.    

It’s the very same as the childhood rains                      

that happily soaked you as you ran barefoot

down the hissing sidewalks     

to the muddy schoolyard

where seasoned earth caressed your feet                                                            

warm drops trickling down your original face               

rivulets along the skin of you naked to the waist    

and the morning passed without explanation.            

Cardinals chirruped in the dripping maples                 

young squirrels cavorted in the loamy yards

crows called out their predictions from building tops 

and the rain kept falling and you did not retreat.              

That all-day shower is here again                       

inviting you back into the quieting alleys  

nourishing the bold hollyhocks that delight you                    

awaiting only your upside smile, your carefree affirmation.