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Writer's pictureCeleste Boudreaux

The Lake in the Rain

In my summer childhood memory

I stand at the edge of the lake

Oblivious to the warm drizzle

A white quilt of mist hovers

two feet above the water

Its thick line dividing dark pines

On the far shore from the lake below

The blue-gray surface of the water

Is a never-ending pattern of musical notes

Circle upon circle, each ever widening

fading and being overwritten

by fresh rain plops


I look to my left towards the western horizon

framed by retreating sentry lines of trees

The sky is dazzlingly alive

A cacophony of vivid color and shape

The jagged leading edge of slate clouds

Is set ablaze by a sinking lava sphere

And streams of light radiate outwards

Like the incandescent aureole

of a saint ascending to heaven

I breathe in its beauty

And my soul expands


Then something taps my right shoulder

And turning, to my awe and delight

A rainbow reaches from shore to shore

It shimmers, delicate and ephemeral

gold, red, blue, and all hues between

In light of its imminent danger of extinction

My eyes swallow eager gulps

as though for my body’s parched need

It is the only quenching there is


Such a feast, this three-course banquet

A sonnet for eyes and heart

Fleeting moment now surviving fifty years





sunset over misty lake

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Such a lovely poem, I see what you see and feel what you feel through your gift of words.

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So beautiful and brightly alive in you, Celeste! I particularly love this: "My eyes swallow eager gulps / as though for my body’s parched need"

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