Blessing

Something about the dimness of a rainy sky has its fingers rooted in my spirit, so that when the rain comes cold and trembling to the thirsty ground, it comes singing like a blessing. It draws me irresistibly outside to hold me close, to hold me shivering and happy, bare-foot in the muddy grass and face tilted to the sky-born water, calling out:

Oh wash my eyes and make me see!
Wash my lips and make them clean,
run down my chin and through my teeth
until I thirst no more!

Beneath me, the earth drinks deep until its pores are full and overflowing in cool streams between my toes. I am too small to do the same: this body cannot hold enough of anything to satisfy my heaven-reaching soul.

Someone’s voice is in the rain and echoes in my brain. It is a love song. It cries:

I love you, I love you,
I will quench your thirst both today and tomorrow,
when the sun returns to wither the grass,
and the earth’s wells run dry.

These words, falling heavy on my chest, steal the breath from my throat.
With my tiny voice drowning in all this thunder, how can I sing my reply?