The Dreamer The rain, o god, the rain teeth biting through my clothes, until the slick skin

of winter opens up onto jagged, uneven sharp rocks. I walk with my head down, collar up on my jacket; my body is my own umbrella. The drain pipes sing as the water pours from the roof top to the small heap of cat's eye marbles that sit below in the mud, catching raindrops. It is now that my feet catch on the moment where the voice of water is the weapon used to trip me until I am face down in small pools and breath is no longer the swirling wind of storm. I cover my head with the shoulders of my denim and I feel my knees with my inner hands. Nothing broken, nothing torn. Clumsy woman. Awkward head-in-the-clouds. I tried calling for help, but the radio was so loud yr name was taken up in the tornado of made up words and syllables without meaning. Once I found I could throw pebbles at the window where you stood drinking coffee & eating homemade bread , I knew I could stand: wet, dirty and pissed off. I thought I would outgrow tripping over my own two feet at least by fifty...