sometimes it all comes

Sometimes it all comes pounding back to me
like a flash flood writhing and twisting through
an empty river bed, swallowing every remnant of dust
and turning the world into a velvety slur of carmine
and deer leather brown, as if to convince the desert
that water exists. And water can still win.

Sometimes it begins as a far-off drone, like locusts,
and slowly approaches in a gradual growing
buzz that makes your fingers tingle and interrupts
everyone's front porch conversation, ties our tongues
and halts the rockers on their planed oak beds.
We look up, but we don't have to.

And sometimes it just falls, like suddenly a child
too weary to stand up slumps over at the neck
and surrenders to the lull of that recalcitrant cloud,
sleep, lucky that mother stands by to take over
life's secondary details, like transportation and warmth.
Sometimes, it just falls.