Downpour

We did not pray for rain in vain.

The sun did not set, so thick were the clouds,

and at the night hour, the rain fell like rock,

massed like rock, and lasting like rock,

without ebb or throb.

It reached the sky, one great mountain

of water and thunder, and we were under.

It overwhelmed the soil–and the noise and light–

it overwhelmed the mind.

One electric blast stayed so long it was no flash,

a blow of light and not a lash.