Rainfall

It is quiet down there
With echoes sleeping lightly on its tether-
Save when, through the still air,
Footfalls break, sharp crack after crack,
Of bursting globes, of stillness set close together,
In a far fading line.
It is quiet down there
But for the rain's faint whispering,
The street is lonely where there might have lingered
Women and men with voices distant, low:
Now the rain only
Light, cool-fingered,
Drips from the trees, drips, drips.
I at my window am lonely:
My thoughts are ships
Which know not whence they come nor wither go,
Sailing forever on the lonely seas,
Forever to and fro. . . .

From - Rainfall : Summer Evening By Geoffrey West