Solemn Seattle Aubade

Rain—after Cameron Barnett

There are houses drowning every night here. What a sin
Rainrainrainrato let the waves swallow them. How I am haunted
by rooftops poking out above the water’s surface,
Rainrainrainrathese reverse skyscrapers bubbling breath
in the CD, fish bones scattered over the hills of Columbia City,
RainrainrainraMount Baker, Rainier Beach. Everything is always
changing here. A new family pushed out every night on Puget Sound.
RainrainrainraA new skyline drifting in before the sun can note their absence.
I come back and barely recognize the city in front me.
RainrainrainraSpend my time on Metro buses whose routes
have shifted so many times I can no longer trace them on maps.
RainrainrainraRide through streets where the businesses I knew are ghosts,
wonder what won’t be here the next time I am. Once I named love
Rainrainrainraa burger shared at my favorite soul food joint.
Now I wonder how to define it in this city. Wonder if there’s anything left
Rainrainrainrafor me to love. The names of every neighborhood I’ve loved
serve as nothing more than a tombstone now. This city will wash away all
Rainrainrainrayou’ve ever known with the rain. My heart is a cemetery
of unmarked graves. I leave flowers by every single one to make sure
Rainrainrainraall the ghosts are fed. There isn’t much left of me that isn’t
haunted. Some days I still walk the southernmost hills of the city.
RainrainrainraLook northward and see the steel buildings poking out
above the trees. Remember waiting for the bus every morning in high school.
RainrainrainraSurviving the gray and slush of winter to see all those
spring mornings. The sun rising to the east out of Lake Washington.
RainrainrainraBurning the tips of the evergreens lining the city’s hills.
Finally, finally something that wouldn’t drown.