Speech of the Rain

What a thing it is to sit 
absolutely alone, 

in the forest, at night, cherished 
by this wonderful, unintelligible, 
perfectly innocent speech, the most 
comforting speech in the world,

the talk that rain makes by itself 
all over the ridges, 
and the talk of the watercourses 
everywhere in the hollows!

Nobody started it, 
nobody is going to stop it. 

It will talk 
as long as it wants, this rain. 

As long as it talks 
I am going to listen.

-- Thomas Merton
“Rain and the Rhinoceros” in Raids on The Unspeakable
(arranged quote)

Out upon the earth

She was out of doors,
only that,
and it came to her
that it was the first time
she'd been out
in days.

The house loomed at her back,
but she never turned her head.

She was watching her feet, concentrating
on keeping her balance
in the roiling sepia
mud that clung to the
toes of her boots and
sucked at her heels.

The rain drummed
at the parasol.

Everything smelled
of fresh-turned earth.

-- T.C. Boyle, San Miguel
(arranged quote)