Ending the Drought
by Elizabeth McBride

It’s raining!
We have waited for so long
we hurry to our doorways and lean out to breathe
the sweet brown smell
of earth licked wet by drops that sip
between roots of curled dry grasses,
trickle down furrows of blackened bark,
and follow matted trenches
in the fields.

It’s raining.
The children stop, put down their toys
and stand tip-toe, edging bare feet toward narrow puddles
forming beneath the eaves.
And we forget that we are grown
reach out to feel the splash and plop
of round fat drops on swollen skin;
savor the cool trail of relief
that traces through our hair
in liquid memories.

It is raining.
Glory be! We stand in awe
to watch the skies unfurl, cascade, and wash us clean.
We think again how little
we can do
to save the world
on our own.

Elizabeth McBride is a Fellow of the National Writing Project, an Amherst Writers and Artists Affiliate, and member of the Michigan Chapter of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators. Ms. McBride’s poetry has been published in The Dunes Review, Third Wednesday, Seeding the Snow, Red River Review, and Scintilla.