the rainchild

, the skin dripped from his fingers & the blood beneath was clearer than the truth, rivulets of rainsong pouring down the storm drain straight to the pacific ocean ; he never needed to cry. "the clouds

shed enough tears for all of us," he told me once and i remember

when i first met him, those arms outstretched & palms like little pools, oases running through lifelines. the fortune teller told him he would only live as long

as the storm

"it's the water in my veins," he said; "it washes away the stardust & we are all drinking our ancestors' ashes, did you know my grandfather tasted," he said, "like raspberry cordial & did you know that freckles

are like nebulae & your cheeks are full of moonlight, did you know that thunder

only claps after the lights go out?"

when i was young i counted miles in the silence before those soundwaves drowned my ears in rumbles. the longer the silence the farther the light & now, my voice is racing to catch up with your radiancy. sometimes we can see but we always hear late & last night i prayed

that some day the light would reach me at the same time the thunder cracked my bones in two & maybe that is why i dreamed up so many nightmares. maybe that is why life always seemed like a burnt photograph, still smoldering on the sidewalk, put out in the rain like a foundling already wrapped in a shroud, rainchild

paint me a sarcophagus on the inside of my throat & if you find my voicebox, crack it with your thunderclapped hands because some days i think we speak too much

of that gray sky & we need to forget ourselves more often, rainchild

will you teach me how to listen?