Mouth of May (The Rain Poet)
Thunder splits open day
lightning seeps neon
into cracks.
Woman moves forward
leaning into sideways
slashing rain.
Ruffled by wind kimono
blends purple velvet
with cherry silk.
Parasol rises over head
like a crimson
mushroom.
From underneath kimono
crinkled ruby flashes
glitters with rain.
Bare-headed servant rushes behind
his rough feet slick
with diamonds.
Rain poet keeps moving
from parched town
to parched town
bringing with her
a deluge
that floods fields
sends villagers scurrying
from darkened sky
pings hollowly in buckets
turns beetle out of his home
endears earthworm to his
loamy mansion
propels buds skyward
opens the mouth of May.
~inspired by Ogata Gekko’s piece “Rain Poetess,” 1887
6 thoughts on "Mouth of May (The Rain Poet)"
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Oh, this is beautiful! So tight, and the
ending is perfect.
Thank you, Nancy! Looking forward to seeing your work on here, too.
What a glorious ekphrastic poem!
My favorite lines are:
“turns beetle out of his home /
endears earthworm to his /
loamy mansion.”
Thank you, Karen!
interesting! did you start out with a set of words or phrases and sort of piece them together or did it more or less kind of flow one line after the next? I like the homage and weather imagery!
Thank you! I really poured over the woodblock print the poem is based on and obsessed over its details–broke the piece down and just kind of went from image to image. I guess it did flow from one line to the next.