A Poetic Soul, Or I Frickin' Love Rain

I'm not much for poetry, not in the sense that we usually associate with it, at any rate. I can appreciate it, and I can understand it, but it is rare that a poem really resonates with me.

I like stories. Characters, lives, events, all hinted at on the page/stage/screen. When that is done well, whole worlds open to the audience. Frequently, those stories have a kind of poetry to them, I guess in that there is an artistry to it, a love the writer must have for the word to use it in such a way as to evoke a given response from his or her audience.

That's the kind of poetry I can get behind. Prose that uses language as more than just a hammer to drive home points, but also as a needle to sew together the pieces of a broken heart, or a file to even out a chipped shoulder, or even a comb to smoothe ruffled feathers.

It is strange that I am frequently driven to poetry by the rain. Few things inspire me so. Music, for which I have an enduring love, tends to put me in too analytical a frame of mind to be creative. Love tends to throw too many endorphins into the mix to fuel that particular fire.

But rain. Especially driving, storming, maybe-I-should-start-building-a-boat-and-gathering-animals-two-by-two kind of rain. Sure, maybe it's some kind of primal, base-brain association of rain with life, or maybe that intense kind of rain triggers the fight-or-flight response, but I find myself filled with a fire that burns away the nigh-constant fog of ADHD and sharpens my focus in a way that nothing else does. Coffee, Ritalin, Mountain Dew... Nothing gets me into a focused frame of mind like a storm.

And then it's gone. The storm passes. That driving energy wanes, softening to a drizzle. And just like that, the rush is gone. My brain goes fuzzy and all I want to do is sleep.

I remember the feeling of elation and being a part of a grander scheme, but then the sky clears and things seem murkier than before. Rather than feeling cleansed by the downpour, I feel muddled and at a loss.

Am I the only one this happens to?!

Ah well. Strange happenings of a Friday night. Perhaps clarity will come with a new day.