National Poetry Month 2022- Poem #24- "We used to have rain..."

Tonight two tankas, stacked on top of each other

"We used to have rain…"

summer afternoons,

free front row seats for lightning 

matinees, pounding

thirty-minute deluges,

then glorious gutter splashing.

now, summer downpours

replaced by life in high desert 

endless days where skies do not yield

months of high fire alerts

where have all the showers gone?

(c) Carol Wilcox, 2022