Ancient and drumming she’s like a god
and aren’t we her submissive and when I am separated
I wonder what she’s doing to the trees and if the mud misses my feet
I wonder if she’s sad that I am not there to catch her
and I am afraid of her absence and startled when skies are so clear
stars single me out what I think I am trying to say
is that rain is a being I want to make a case for rain as a being
I know some think of rain as something
that just happens or a minor annoyance ruining
an opportune moment and some think of rain only
when the air sparks and they taste ash but listen
rain is living in relationship with all other beings
biomes, fungi, and foxes and humans like you
right now are in a private relationship with rain
adapted modified amended and customized to her existence
imagine rain unsinking from soil withdrawing
her botanical breath or gray scent of wet rock
falling back up mountains and unrushing from the sky imagine
after the only sound is the grit of salt
stirring into dust and you smell rain in your sleep like someone
you once knew and in your dreams you carry notes
you collage by blues and grays from memory
if to be a being is to be alive which is to have some quality
that distinguishes a vital and functional being from death
then tell me if her absence is our absence
when she comes will you call her by her name?
—
Mistee St. Clair is a Rasmuson Foundation and Alaska Literary Award grantee and has been published by The Alaska Quarterly Review, The Common, Northwest Review, SWWIM Every Day, and more. She is of European and Tanana Athabascan descent and is an enrolled tribal member of the Native Village of Minto. She lives in Lingít Aaní (Juneau), where she hikes, writes, wanders the mossy rainforest, and is an editor for the Alaska State Legislature.
