Rain

This is an older photo that I took last fall on a rainy day.  Originally posted it in color- it had yellowish leaves and dark red deck behind it.  I never really loved it.  Last week my sister was asking for a certain photo so I came across this one and thought I should run it with some black and white edits- I liked it much better.  I posted it on facebook but want to also include it here- along with a quote from Henry David Thoreau that I like.  Thoreau was always my favorite in high school and college.. somehow I identified with that Walden Pond idea. :)

Some of my pleasantest hours were during the long rainstorms in the spring or fall, which confined me to the house for the afternoon as well as the forenoon, soothed by their ceaseless roar and pelting; when an early twilight ushered in a long evening in which many thoughts had time to take root and unfold themselves. ~Thoreau-Walden

One last rain poem I like:

How heavy fell the rain that day

From burdened clouds of mournful grey.

The torrent forced them stay their height-

Composure swayed by onerous might.

My skin wrung wet with icy chill

As mud embraced that sodden hill;

But mind of mine had elsewhere gone-

Twas clouds abandoned I was on.

The driving drops advanced their gears

To camouflage my sneaking tears-

Whence now did swell such floods of pain

To see me melt into this rain...

On equal bearing now were we:

This rain, myself, in harmony.

(author: Mark R Slaughter)