rainstorm on a school day
Gainesville, FL
2021, Junior, Poetry & Spoken Word
“Miami will be underwater by 2100”
the doomsday radio hosts foretell, their filtered discourse
intermingling with the thrumming downpour outside—
lost to the white noise of unabating rainfall and muted disinterest
on the bus, I lean my forehead against tepid glass, peering
through the window at a smattering of gossamer teardrops, each streaming
earthbound with tenuous fervor in an imaginary race, merging and cleaving apart
to the cadence of pocket-sized rapids; around us, the cloudburst comes in
fits and starts, a deluge of erroneous forecasts/pilfered rain checks
tentative, we turn the corner onto the intersection,
showering passersby with milky freshwater breakers;
in the distance, chain-linked fences patrol the projects—
households forged from scattered brick shingles and faucets that
regurgitate swollen lead tides coming and going in
pewter-tinted rivulets, receding back towards inexorable thirst:
symptoms of existential negligence or partisan corrosion?
nearby turbid fluid run(s)off, flushed across the sidewalk
down into oxidized storm drains; opposite the traffic guard,
children take cover under cartoonishly oversized backpacks
as they pelt along asphalt puddles in barefooted rhapsody
Spotify shuffles through another playlist, and while
adjusting my lopsided earbuds, a hopeless notion flits past—
an invocation, some whimsical longing to unwind the skein of time
before oil wells pierced our delicate loam, asphyxiating avarice
wringing dry the stolen lands and petrol-soaked oceans;
before we clogged our carbon sink with rhetorical rubbish, plastic
lids and emptied promises lining our riverbeds in synthetic decomposition;
before noxious gas fled from their coal-fired power plants, engulfing our glaciers in
flammable atrophy—a global waterboard of fish bones and ossifying metropolises.
here, I scribble half-finished love letters to the next generation
in hopes of sheathing clean slates from putrid contamination;
delay the clock just long enough to pivot our world on its tilted axis
and resuscitate every poison-laced mangrove, every drowned saltmarsh—
rewrite the futures for families who have not yet been born
but as the overcast retires its wrath for another season,
the tiger-striped school bus jostles its way to my stop; I
step with newfound reverence onto drenched pavement,
taste humid petrichor on my tongue, and pray there will be
a next time for us all to savor these rainy afternoons.
Reflection
Reflection
The opening line about Miami being underwater by 2100 was actually paraphrased from an old New Yorker article discussing coastal sea levels that had been rising at an alarming rate for the past few decades. As I sat down to write this poem, it was one of the first things that came to mind, possibly because of how bleak and abject the prediction seemed at the time. Six years later, it pains me to think that little has changed since then—if anything, ignorance and indifference in regards to climate change has only increased. Whether it be at school, at home, or while riding the bus, I'm acutely aware of how intertwined our communities really are, with water as one of the most indispensable connections out there. After all, it is the very life force that molds humanity into being and keeps each and every one of us alive; indeed, our blue marble would be little without water. By describing the little everyday details (raindrops on window panes, puddles on pavement, tap water, etc.), I wanted to emphasize how ubiquitous this resource really is in daily life, as well as encouraging readers not to take our privilege and accessibility for granted. I hope that my writing will have helped galvanize individuals into action towards sustaining and promoting the conservation of water. It is up to this generation to stand strong in the face of inscrutable adversity, money-grubbing demagogues, and secure the blessings of a safe, clean planet for those to come.