Passing Storm

I will forever be possessed by the Spring rains and brilliant Summer storms of my childhood that frequently graced our countryside farm. Big magnificent storms often rolled in unannounced, where fear and freedom came together as we watched in awe from where we stood. They came in fast, spawned between Heaven and Earth, with my soul somewhere, meeting at their center. Never can I forget the days the rain would start to fall with the first giant drops hitting me as the clouded skies would blacken fast as shadows merging together, turning day to a haunting night of magical twilight colors, where all blues would turn to deep translucent greens, towering up into the mountainous rolls of gray with their columns of black rain, growing a monstrous wall, taller and taller, shedding off the last thin sliver of sparkled light that torched only the very tips of running clouds, just before it all flowed downward and across our pastures blowing Bermuda grasses into rolling waves of shimmering light dancing against their silk green blades. The enormous oak trees would come alive, twisting and bowing like paper mache dolls, while the sunflowers would bow in unison. Fresh linen sheets on the clothesline whipped like sails in a gale-force sea. In the twirling magnificent rage, the sky blasts open with no warning, showering down massive sheets of warm and cold rain with giant drops, clear and silver, engulfing everything. Fear was but a moment in me that turned to elation, the beating of my chest. I then ran crazed, full of the lightning, with my mother's voice, frantic in the distance, being drowned in the overpowering storm. The rains came first, then hale began to pelt me in its furious gusts as I laughed wildly insane into the wind until it laughed back at me. Small rivers began to flow over my bare feet. The mysterious smell of ozone mist assaulted all my senses as I ran full speed into the storm, chasing the eyes center out into the fields of fury. The skies above opened wider as the clouds fell down around me with shattering booms, swallowing me in its rage, where I tempted the heavens with my arms outstretched to throw her lightning bolts through me, bright jagged streaks that were clawing ferociously down to earth with each roar.

And then as fast as the storm had arrived, and faster than I could run, it left without pause. The wispy fringe of the clear black towers fleeing in the distance. I watched them move on like a passing slow train, leaving me standing alone with water running down my face and dripping from my chin, the fading deep rumble and flashes of lightning now at a great distance. I stood silent for no Godly reason, stood alive like a triumphant warrior pierced through the heart...