Inward Renewal

Each day clouds gather and mount promising rain.  The humidity is oppressive like a nagging headache.  Some days I think I can smell the rain and can’t wait for the first good rainfall.  Below is an excerpt from one of the kid’s books, Bringing the Rain to Kapiti Plain by Verna Aardema.

This was the shot
that pierced the cloud
And loosed the rain
with thunder LOUD!                                                                      
A shot from the bow,
so long and strong,
And strung with a string,
a leather thong;
A bow for the arrow
Ki-pat put together,
With a slender stick
and an eagle feather;
From the eagle who happened
to drop a feather,
A feather that helped
to change the weather.
It fell near Ki-pat,
who watched his herd
As he stood on one leg,
like a big stork bird;
Ki-pat, whose cows
were so hungry and dry,
They mooed for the rain
to fall from the sky;
To green-up the grass,
all brown and dead,
That needed the rain
from the cloud overhead -
The big, black cloud,
all heavy with rain,
That shadowed the ground
on Kapiti Plain.