Memorable writing that sparks imagination. Lean in. Hear the writer’s voice on the page.
Seasonal Considerations in 14 Stanzas
By Christine Renaudin
Yesterday’s rain was announced,
yet came as a surprise,
we’ve grown so used to dreading drought and fire.
Yesterday’s rain was a gift
early for the wet season,
tardy for the thirsty and parched.
Yesterday’s rain relieved anxieties,
expectations, released myriads of winged
insects dancing in today’s afternoon sunlight.
Some are termites, I think, roused by the premature sprinkle.
They flutter aimlessly as if lost in the midst of dream.
In two hours, I hear, their wings will fall and drop them home to thrive or die.
Yesterday’s rain took us inside
trading shade for shelter
to share a Sunday lunch with friends.
Today the sun glistens over puddles,
the air feels clean, cobwebs glitter,
alive with earthy fragrances.
Breath deepens, heart quickens,
there is a bounce in the season:
I want to catch its tune.
Soon the grass will grow green again
before the first frosty mornings,
as usual I wish for a drizzle on my birthday.
Inside, a child wonders,
tracing California with a finger on a blue rug:
“the world does not fit on a rug.
Too many maps crowding Wikipedia
telling stories of migrations
—atoms, animals, tectonic plates, people—
Over centuries and beyond
six thousand years old for some,
several billion years for many, many, most others.
The world is worth a million maps before one rug is born
out of the weaver’s hand or the machine that replaced it,”
the child pursues aloud within mother’s earshot.
My child has grown, she thinks,
like grass on October Sundays
between new and full moon.
I see the fruit of the buckeye dangling like tiny lanterns in the dusky sky;
soon persimmons will hang round and orange in naked branches,
like ornaments out of season glowing through morning fog or against bright blue skies.
Christine Renaudin’s writing has been featured in several of The Write Spot’s Sparks, as well as in The Write Spot anthologies: “Discoveries,” and “Musings and Ravings From a Pandemic Year,” available at your local bookseller and on Amazon (print and as an e-reader).
Christine lives, writes, and paints in Petaluma, CA. She is also a dancer. Her most recent performances in 2022 include Sunset in Spring (Fort Bragg, May 2022), The Slow Show (San Francisco, September 2022), Run, Or Don’t (San Francisco, April 2023).An avid practitioner of Contact Improvisation, she facilitates the monthly West Marin Contact Improvisation Jam at The Dance Palace in Point Reyes Station. She loves to see these various practices interact and inform her art-making process.
