The shades are pulled, but still I hear the rain. Under the streetlight
The street glistens in my mind, burnished in the same rainwater
That has been coming back
Since the first cloud-cover drenched the first burning stone of the world.
The same rain, its common shining. But this night is singular.
I want to hold it.
Yet it is not this night but you I want to keep-miracle
In the century of my own life, safe to the centuries after,
Just as you are-
The very gesture of your hands pushing back through your white hair,
Or your teeth biting your underlip as you dance, your eyes held
On an inward vision,
Like the chosen of God, who dance where the Rock of Origin remembers
The earliest rains. Yet what can they know as it was from long vanished hisstory?
There's only rainwater.
The human part of those ancient faiths which still live in our own time,
Once real as the beautiful names of Israel, is lost sight of,
Is general as the rain.
Even for my own need I can't find words to carry you clear of this age,
Yet known as yourself. We live only in time, and what is historical passes
Leaving relics.
And even the relics of history pass. But the rain comes back always the same.
When you have left me, I will imagine you sometimes, but only rainwater
Will be as I imagine.