Heavy Summer Rain
The grasses in the field have toppled, and in places it seems that a large, now absent, animal must have passed the night. The hay will right itself if the day turns dry. I miss you steadily, painfully. None of your blustering entrances or exits, doors swinging wildly on their hinges, or your huge unconscious sighs when you read something sad, like Henry Adams’s letters from Japan, where he traveled after Clover died. Everything blooming bows down in the rain: white irises, red peonies; and the poppies with their black and secret centers lie shattered on the lawn.
Credit
Jane Kenyon, "Heavy Summer Rain" from Collected Poems. Copyright © 2005 by the Estate of Jane Kenyon. Reprinted with the permission of The Permissions Company, Inc., on behalf of Graywolf Press, graywolfpress.org.
Author
Jane Kenyon

Jane Kenyon was born on May 23, 1947, in Ann Arbor, Michigan. She is the author of four books of poetry, including Constance (Graywolf Press, 1993). The recipient of a fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts, Kenyon died on April 22, 1995.
Date Published: 2005-01-01
Source URL: https://poets.org/poem/heavy-summer-rain