The Aqueous Forest

Rain has brought mist to the forest
a grey veil smooth and soft its
moist warmth lending a semi-opaque
screen to the landscape while
imbuing the forest green in delicate
shades, a pale watercolour version
of its spring vibrancy as the forest
canopy and its understory begin to
recall and long for their former glory
bursting with summer verdance where
goldfinches and song sparrows alight
and vibrate the air with their lilting
song. Now, in the pale gloom of a
sky brimming with dark clouds the
prolonged, mournful hoot of an owl
perched on an overhead branch jutting
over a wildly rushing creek coursing
at the bottom of the ravine wherein
the forest sits. Then a languid silence.
Rain begins once more to penetrate
the forest fastness drumming on
tree trunks, creating concentric waves
on widening pools steaming on the 
forest floor, drowning fallen seed pods
creating rivulets of mud rushing down 
the hillsides to inundate the creek 
upstream from the river beyond the forest. 
And.then.it.stops. The atmosphere suffused 
with rain brightens as the sun briefly
emerges and the rain resumes, both sun
and rain together greeting the sodden
forest. A forest that breathes and thrives.