After Rain

By BRIAN SIMONEAU 

The wind comes warm as breath
and stirs me like laundry
on a line. Then it’s gone. Life
weaves itself together
from next to nothing;
it’s all these moments
I want, to take them in
before they’re taken away.
A patch of blue breaches clouds
the way green comes to winter
and the black of a raven’s
something I can hardly stand
the beauty of: unshadowed
or itself a shadow
untethered from things. It coasts
across the opening sky
on motionless wings
as if it too notices
a ray of light threading
its way into the world.

 

 

Originally from Lowell, Massachusetts, Brian Simoneau graduated from Amherst College and received an MFA at the University of Oregon. He lives in Connecticut with his wife and their two daughters. His first book of poems, River Bound (C&R Press 2014), won the De Novo Prize.

From the beginning, The Common has brought you transportive writing and exciting new voices. We are committed to supporting writers and maintaining free, unrestricted access to our website, but we can’t do it without you. Become an integral part of our global community of readers and writers by donating today. No amount is too small. Thank you!

After Rain

Related Posts

I/Teh Ran

SARVIN PARVIZ
We were celebrating a friend’s birthday in our group chat, signing his birthday card, together apart, when Israel launched the strikes. Now we are on the call, and someone says she was making Adaspolo, preparing the lentils when she heard the strike. She could stop, she thought to herself, that she should.

A sculpture bunny leaning against a book

Three Poems by Mary Angelino

MARY ANGELINO
The woman comes back each week / to look at me, to look / at regret—that motor stuck in the living / room wall, ropes tied / to each object, spooling everything in. She / comes back to watch / what leaving does. Today, her portrait / splinters—last month, it was only / askew

A horseshoe crab on the sand

Cape May, midsummer

EVELYN MAGUIRE
I become a house lived-in. Living in my mother’s house, again, it’s easy to drift into the past. Blue bottle light, dust motes, a silver rattle. The sound of it: butterfly wings. I am tender towards everything. Everything is a child and I am everything’s mother.