"Life in Rain."

Dancing in the Rain

I danced in the rain though I knew I’d get wet and it would take eons for my clothes to dry-- I danced anyway. I danced as the clouds erupted into waterfalls of fury, like melted glaciers in the sky, or wicked witches of Oz. I danced because I could, because I would. I danced to defy nature’s wrath to create rain worthy of gods. I danced because I felt like dancing, because moping would do me no good. I danced to celebrate the rain, to cleanse myself with it like Bathsheba in David’s yard. I danced to expunge myself – to become one with the rain, like a fairy in a flower just blooming. I danced to dance, because my soul danced. I danced because soon enough, the rain began to dance-- it started with one drop and then another, I heard reggae. I caught my reflection in a puddle, just dancing, dancing. I caught the rain in a puddle, just dancing, dancing. I danced-- just me and the rain.

-Chaya Silberstein from www.EatingPoetry.com

It rained the other day. The day before the clouds stood scattered in the sky with moisture in my nostrils. I could smell the rain, and I waited for it. I waited all day and night, and finally when I woke the next morning there she was, drops of rain on my patio. I have had many great moments with rain in my life. When I was younger and the rain came down over the mountains back home, I lay out in the gutters of my neighborhood in streams of water feeling it want to carry me away in to some drainage pond where the water rested. I use to raise mixing bowls above my head to gather the rain and pour it in to mason jars to safely save in a basement fridge. What is this connection with the rain I have, this draw to the elements of nature? So the other day when it rained, I thought of my many adventures with her. I thought the other day of the summer rains here and the warm water in the humid air. I will share with you one of those days, and one of those dances.

Monday, August 31st, the year of our Lord Two Thousand Nine.

It rained the other night. I stood out on my balcony naked and felt the flow of water on my skin. It rained hard, and I could hear the drip-drop pattering of puddles on my patio and the rhythmic bumble beating of ferocious thunder, so I stripped off my clothes to bare skin and stood outside, nude in the night, the city around me. Lightning tranced and trampled in strobes. The flash photography of the flickering light created snapshots of the dark, and I captured each moment in every flash, each drop of rain focused against the next, neon lights, the sight, and sound, and smell of brick and cement, and my own skin, wet, and pulsing, and smooth.

Each vein in me breathed. I felt the rain on me and I asked for no forgiveness, nor mercy from the storm. My wavy hair, dampened and straight, dripped drops on to my chest. I called out, and challenged, and danced, and shouted. I lay down, my naked body in the puddles, rain hard upon me, and I felt those puddles, and the water, and the cement against my skin, pressed against my body, and I splashed, and shook, and moved my arms and legs like snow angels in the pools of my patio. I was naked and alone, and in love with the moment, in love with the rain on my skin and splashing in puddles and kicking water against the walls, and the thunder that drummed, and the lighting that scattered. I stood there in the rain until the storm died down, knowing it could not beat me, nor would it want to. This was my welcome home to Yeosu, my communion with Korea...

Thursday, October 22nd, the year of our Lord Two Thousand Nine.

...The other night there was a storm. The wind woke me at 3:00 a.m. I went to my window and opened it, the wind whirling in a dark howl. the neon lights of the city peered through the darkness and across the way the clouds grew deeper in night and slowly rolled in over horizons and mountains. I could see the storm as it came in. The sky morphed black and I could see it and feel the air as it turned and the sounds of the coming storm shortened until it was all upon me. My head was out my window staring in with the night among the thunder and lightning and the rain in smashing drops, and just as I watched the storm march in, so too I watched its retreat from the city, sounds and sights fading until only a softer whistling of a once forceful wind. I think this is the Korea I will remember...

So to you three people who may read this, as you are back safely home in America full in to winter, think of such moments as these. Have you let yourself go naked in a storm, just to feel the exhilaration of only caring about the things worth caring for? Have you let your skin feel the breeze of a public air and a rain that is privately yours? May we all have such moments. May we all dance our song is played.

Dance naked in the rain

I wish this for everyone at least once in their life time To dance naked in the rain with utter and unabashed abandon

Catching raindrops in their mouth and nose because Their face is turned toward heaven and all their skin Is soaking up heaven's gift of water, H2O Showers of powers

Not under a thunderstorm with wicked lightning looming Then stay under the eves of the porch and watch, while rocking

I'm talking about the warm summer rain after a long dry spell After the thirsty ground sucks up all the first sprinkles

When it's really pouring, step out of your clothes and Ya'all come out of your houses, spread your arms and twirl Arch your back and howl, croon to the moon

Fill the streets - together Fill your soul - together With the joy of dancing

Naked in the rain

-Carolyn Churchill from www.writingblooms.com

Many dance when the pattering of rain is a beckoning sound. Observers watch the rain. Participants dance in the rain, but lovers, we dance with the rain.