Looks Like Rain - Nov 3 2024

 

Looks Like Rain

Nov 3 2024

Looks like rain, she says.

I warily scan the sky

looking for tell-tale clouds,

darkly ominous

and moving fast.

Overcast, yes,

but can’t say for sure.

I’m standing

in the half-shadow

of indirect sun,

a liminal light

that makes it feel like the world

is holding its breath.

While in the distance

the light is cool, distilled,

making everything appear

precise as cut-glass.

I feel on the cusp

of things beyond my control,

and this atavistic rush

is rising up in me.

It comes from feeling small.

From witnessing forces

that are vast and capricious

I’m unable to resist.

From how the gut-deep sense

that something big is coming

brings the thrill of the unknown.

Trouble is, it always looks like rain,

a sunny day,

a sudden windstorm.

Because things change in a flash.

Because a butterfly flapping its wings

on some Melanesian atoll

half a world away,

can ripple through the atmosphere

in unpredictable ways

and trigger great events.

And because the sky is enigmatic

despite what she says;

no way to tell

what’s really coming,

how fast it’s moving,

how bad it will be.

I suppose you could place this poem with all the others I've written that pit nature vs man. Poems about human hubris, perfidy, transience. (Spoiler alert: nature wins!) In this case, the smug presumption we can predict the weather, read the sky. An over-worked trope, I know. But a poem has a mind of its own, and I’m just going along for the ride.

It’s also about chaos theory: that small changes can have disproportionate effects as they cascade, are amplified, and trigger positive feedback loops. The butterfly flapping its wings may be a tired cliché, but there is no better example of this non-linearity than weather.

We live in a time when both themes are particularly salient. Climate change — the only issue that really matters — is setting off positive feedback loops that may have already turned it into a runaway train: that is, irreversible, no matter how clever we think we are, or how pre-ordained we imagine our survival. (“Our” being either our civilization or our species; take your pick.) And the aftermath of Donald Trump returning to power (the 2024 US election is 2 days away; its resolution who knows how long) may set off — degree by irreversible degree — the dismantling of democracy in the country that’s its pre-eminent exemplar, while an apathetic, ignorant, or uninformed electorate (not to mention the complicit opportunists and true-believers, who should know better) are distracted by either cute cats on their screens, or the irresistible swamp of hot-button social media. Or both.

(Just stuff on my mind . . . and maybe why poems don’t have as much a mind of their own as I thought!)