Tag: rain

“Providence,” Natasha Trethewey

What’s left is footage: the hours before
      Camille, 1969—hurricane
            parties, palm trees leaning
in the wind,
      fronds blown back,

a woman’s hair. Then after:
      the vacant lots,
      boats washed ashore, a swamp

where graves had been. I recall

how we huddled all night in our small house,
      moving between rooms,
            emptying pots filled with rain.

The next day, our house—
      on its cinderblocks—seemed to float
in the flooded yard: no foundation

beneath us, nothing I could see
      tying us      to the land.
      In the water, our reflection
                  trembled,
disappeared
when I bent to touch it.

“Acquainted With the Night,” Robert Frost

I have been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain – and back in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city light.

I have looked down the saddest city lane.
I have passed by the watchman on his beat
And dropped my eyes, unwilling to explain.

I have stood still and stopped the sound of feet
When far away an interrupted cry
Came over houses from another street,

But not to call me back or say good-bye;
And further still at an unearthly height,
A luminary clock against the sky

Proclaimed the time was neither wrong nor right.
I have been one acquainted with the night.