RainThis morning, it is raining in my country. Water slides down the leaves, like tongue on skin. The sound of their falling collects, like breath on the lobes of ears. You are a continent away. There, the leaves are beginning to turn. Soon night will steal hours from day, and snow will be whirling in drifts. But you are here, in the country of my mind, wiping away the maps of mist on the window pane, lying in bed beside me, as the pulse of the pillows and sheets— even the very throb of rain— begins to quicken.

