It was evening, and it was finally raining after almost two weeks of close but no cigar. A car drove by the house, wheels sibilant and splashy. I’d seen the headlights a few blocks away, but all early sound of its movement was buried beneath water marching across the pavement, making them as distant and unconnected to this world as swamp lights, or now you. I was standing on the front stoop, under the awning and out of the rain, thinking about you in your far away place. The cloud tops were outlined by continuous lightning somewhere beyond them. Later, the weatherman would tell me the clouds topped out at about fifty-five thousand feet, insurmountable for even determined travelers. I wanted to make a video of the scene to share with you later, but like when someone you’re waiting to meet has their flight rerouted to Davenport because of storms, later was somewhere in another lifetime that I could only imagine.