Billowing Rain on a Sunday

You’re sitting on a sofa, a dim lamp near.
You have a Persian carpet to your left.
You have a few silver figures on your coffee table.
Silence in the room is hippopotamus-heft.
Tim’s visiting his uncle Paul in Spain,
Fred’s rehearsing for his concert next week.
You’re sitting by the window, a little pain
tickles as a fleshless finger at your sight of rain,
yet it may not be for the reason you think,
that you’re simply lonely like unused ink.
The billowing rain on this Sunday afternoon
is not the cause of pain, nor loneliness perhaps,
but maybe a man in agony who’ll die soon.
He might live across the street or two streets down.
What pain you feel is not just your own.
You feel others’ pain, though they’re unknown.

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