The Rain of Our Reality

 

A Sunday in July

Children playing in shallow river pools;
fat grandpas sleeping in the shade.

Burnt leaves on sagging shrubs;
robins munching on wiggling worms.

Cold beer and crispy chips;
music playing from cellphone chips.

I watched them baptize a weeping woman,
now saved from the fires of hell,
safe and soaking wet.

A firecracker cut the laughter,
dogs barked, babies cried,
the smell of powder smoked by.

Hamburgers coated in ketchup red,
laced with lettuce on tired bread,
bit by bit down the hatch,
bellies satisfied at last.

Corndogs and cornbread,
beans and coleslaw;
dirty paper plates in paper bags,
pink vomit on the green grass. 

Riverbed rocks bit their cold toes,
mosquitoes bit their sun burnt backs,
lovers bit their aroused lips,
infants bit their mommies tits.

Dry ground,
centuries of death things
underfoot,
covered by a grey wool blanket
hiding this Distant Past. 

In this way on this day
the thousands of drip drops of experiences
make up
the rain of our reality. 

- Lewis River Park, Battleground, Clark County, Washington
  By Michael P. Garofalo, Poetry