The first rain swept through the atmosphere

With its scent of water fresh from the clouds,

Of lawns newly mowed, of the red leaf

Bursting into the bud of its bloom:

The earth was a samovar filled

By the kiss of the rain, and love

Was a scent and a sip of tea.

Here I was, ill-prepared dreamer,

Ill-prepared for the flesh of a dream

Falling to my body as my lips fell to you,

New love, first love, my dear,

And I stood in awe, overwhelmed

By the sudden sex, the sudden purity,

The sudden profundity of our love,

Fresh as a bouquet, wounded

As a stolen bloom in a vase.

And what vase, what body could contain

The stolen bloom, the stolen dream

Of our love?

Perhaps if I hold you close enough,

Long enough, dear, our bodies

Will fuse or weld together like steel

Or carbon, like love united our

Pliable hearts with a single glance–

Or was it a kiss? I don’t remember–

And into that union we can place

Our cosmic intensity: your shifting,

Maternal hips, my anchored, seminal aspirations.

Let us delight in this scent, and drink the tea

Of our kiss as long as it lingers

On our slippery tongues and warms,

Like semen, our insides;

For when the first cloud passes

The first scent is lost in a torrent of rain,

But the freshness remains, embedded

In the soil and the new leaves

Like a seed of hope tossed

Into the tired dreams of the human soul.

Written on Monday, April 28th, 2003