We Long For Rain

A vile wind and salt,
Swept from the belly of oceans chains to bind,
Where hands of men cannot tether your boundless limbs.
You arrive like a swan
silent, unseen, until your fist fills the sky,
And in that sacred moment, we recall—
The forgotten tongue of flight.

For you are neither written law nor wild rebellion,
Neither the grand city nor the untamed woods.
You are the stream, the river lost,
Carving a path simply by flowing.

You are the anthem,
Not the song they sing in crowded streets,
Nor the iambs poets craft beneath civil skies.
You are the shadow, the sable pulse that lives,
A rhythm ancient as breath,
A reminder, even in silence,
Of a heartbeat we cannot forget.

You, twin to the earth, wavering beneath our soles,
bygone, restless, stirring bones to stone with gentle might.
Your lips, like currants, soft upon the vines,
that curl unseen through every heart,
In the darkest chambers where our fears take root,
A hand that trembles strikes a match, a flicker,
the smallest flame,
illuminates the mind.

Freedom,
You need no invitation.
You arrive as a storm unbound,
Cleaving the sky with your fierce grace,
As you rise, you give us the rain—
The rain we did not know we longed for.

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