The ginger spangling of her small bones

She Brings Rain
For Kim

Every time she flies in, her plane snags a cloud.
One cloud snags another and all the others bunch
up to see what it’s all about. Happens every time.
Texas is a flatiron of drought and stunk boots. Her
father lives in his hill country house and regularly
tracks the stables in. Giant might have been shot
here, but it wasn’t and she dare not tell him so.
When he curses the sky, she stays out of sight.
Barometers swell shivers in her mere presence.

I say her hips are what change pressures in the sky,
the ginger spangling of her small bones rocking up
against the world like they do. Those same hips have
rocked mine in long afternoons, under shade-ravened
piñons when sun stabs anything that dares move.
Monsoon season in Santa Fe and the small of her
back summons delicate surges to gleam sweat along
lordless mountains nailed to windworn crosses
where red pores bleed a sweet-clayed rain.



You may find her in Morocco or Paris, upstate in
Yorks so new they name them again and again.
She’ll be blueburn under fireflint, her crest ablaze,
her skytrodden eyes making holes in your chest so
wide they can be seen from space. This is her way.
Call off the Zia dancing and cancel the corn prayers.
Douse your bundled sage; put up those pointless diviners.
Spread sandshot muslin and set her a place at your
parched table. She’ll pour the clouds. She’ll bring rain.

Joseph Gallo
September 29, 2009