Beautiful Rain

I am wrapped in the deeds of the words that have made me.

It is a beautiful rain. I turn towards you to tell you what you already know, that I love the warm rain in the city, but you are not there. The drenched empty half of the bench to my right glistens blue, then yellow, then red, and then back to blue again in harmony with the flashing neon lights in the Pizzeria sign across the narrow cobblestone street.  The small city garden behind the bench that bustles with children and their mothers during the day is silent and unmoving in the night. It is a moonless darkness and there isn't a soul about. I look leftwards, down the hill to the river. On the two sidewalks, evenly spaced gas lamps are shrouded in a fine mist, their feeble light barely reflecting off the wet cobblestones.  Bright light spills out of a few street-level windows from the row of two-story brownstones that hug the street on both sides. I sit there and watch the familiar scene.

When I turn back towards you, I know you have been watching me for a while. I reach for your hand and slide my body on the bench to be closer to you. The warm rain washes down your face. When I look into your eyes, I can see our little world reflected in your unspilt tears. I reach for your face, cupping it with my hands and whisper, "I don't remember, love. I don't remember what I am supposed to do."

Ribbon

In the dead of winter, I live at the water's edge.

Autumn leaves are long since buried under several feet of snow. Barren trees stand tall in silent vigil. There are secrets here that hibernate in the harsh winter, but all one has to do to survive is to not disturb their sleep.

Shrill cries of ravens had broken the deep quiet and woken me up early this morning. When I came outside and looked, there were too many of them to count. I watched them fly in chaotic circles around the last standing wall in the ruins that shadowed our home. Their battle was not mine. Against whatever evil that drew them here, whether they emerged victorious or perished, their cause was not mine. So I turned my back to them and walked down to the frozen beach. I would wait things out at the water's edge, near the unbreached sanctuary of the vast ocean. I stood still for a long while, hands clenched inside my jacket pockets, striving to drive the world out of my mind. 

"Why won't you come when I call?"

I turn around to look at you. Wild eyes, skin pale as the dead winter, disheveled hair, the skin tight top of a black gown ending in a flared feathered skirt with a long train that hid your feet, the ribbon in your dark hair matching the color of the bright red trail of blood in the snow behind you. 

"All I heed is your heart," I whispered softly so that you would not hear, and turned back around to the shelter of the waves.