Kissed by Rain: Poems About Rain and the World It Creates

For some, rain breathes life into parched landscapes, coaxing vibrant greens and blossoms from the earth. To others, it washes urban streets clean, unveiling intricate details and forgotten corners. Rain possesses a unique ability to gently touch and subtly transform everything it encounters. Here, in this collection of poems, we celebrate the quiet wonder of rain as it kisses and revitalizes the world around us.
Movements in the Wild by Shobha Tharoor Srinivasan
Lolloping zebras in the savanna,
A leopard’s curvet from the trees.
Monkeys swing with their bananas,
Hippos huddle where they please.
A giraffe’s long-limbed graceful amble
A large pachyderm’s swaying gait
The wildebeest’s swift-footed gamble
As loping lions roam and wait.
Hyenas saunter to their carrion
Tall emus stride and stroll
Vultures descend with their clarion
Rhinos toe-walk to their goal.
But then the sudden cloudburst-
The afternoon downpour-
Grasses glisten as rain fills its thirst,
The Serengeti begs for more.
But animals run for shelter
Gazelles hasten their annual move
The BIG FIVE is helter skelter
Hurtling on hind and hoove!
Their movements mark a purpose.
Their travel a wet-season range.
Flowing water never a surplus.
But the foraging has a change.
The rains touch and transform everything.
It can flood and it can nourish.
Rains grow the earth but deluge bring.
Objects destroyed yet systems flourish.

I love movies with Rain as a character by Anamika Nath
Rain has always been a character.
How it transforms the scene and the
Narrative! A Kathak dancer
starts the bol of Teentaal: lifts
her anarkali skirt and merges with the rain.
It dances on rooftops,
splashes through city streets,
gently taps on the windows,
as the mom pulls out the scented letters
of yesteryears and the incense fumes
hug her grey hairs, while the window chimes
feel the slithering by winds,
the secrets flood with the downpour.
The Rain tells stories
of longing and bewilderment;
the kiss of star-crossed lovers,
the cleansing of past wounds,
or the outstretching arms,
the newfound freedom,
washing away the old and ushering in the new.
Rain speaks of melancholy and introspection,
like the hauntingly beautiful scenes
where the rain amplifies the unspoken tension
and forbidden desire between the characters.
Or the poignant moments
where rain-drenched streets witness the silent,
heart-wrenching bond
between a father and son
caught in a world of crime and redemption.
It’s in the reflective pools where they
see their true selves, in the relentless downpour
that hides tears, and in the gentle drizzle
that brings solace. Rain marks transitions,
from sorrow to joy, from despair to hope,
and from isolation to connection.
the journey to be one with the rain,
with each droplet,
with every catch and miss.

Dharwad Rain by Ajay Koyimuttal
It was too much heat and
It became cloudy.
Suddenly there was lightning,
Thunderstorms and rain.
It rained over and across
The roads of Jubilee circle
On the metal head of
The Ambedkar statue.
The tin roofs of the Chigri bus,
Got the hammering from
The silver nails too.
Sending rhythmic tones
To whoever sat within it.
It rained on the dusty old scooter
Unveiling its name to the world
"Bajaj Chetak"- like it was a fossil.
The kids in the white shirt and
Blue shorts ran around to collect
The ice cubes of the hail.
It rained on their tiny heads.
Over the tripling college boys
On their Splendor Plus and
Over the empty Kingfisher bottles
To mock the chill out of the beer.
It rained on hospital signboards
That said 'do not honk.'
It rained over a punctured tyre
That just wanted to burn in fire.
Over the pigeons and the crows
And the maize feed that they
Wanted to eat- that's how
Their hot meal turned cold.
It wanted to rain on Elliot's
Wastelands too and Silvia's
Fig tree before it could even
Branch out more.
Even on Bukowski's whores
And wine and on that
Frost's road not taken and its
Fresh grass; till one could-
No longer tell the difference
From the other one.
But it strictly wanted to be local,
For some reason.
So it let Karim Mulla's grave
Drench and Chakkadi Balya's
Thirst quench.
By the smell of Mirchi Girmit
It let the crowd elate.
And one of those tractors
To pass playing a Janapad song
On full blast- It let itself
Loosen up a bit to have-
A little fun for a while and
Dance in Tappanguchi style.
*Mirchi Girmit- local food prepared from puffed rice
*Janapad song- Songs in local slang often played in tractors
*Tappanguchi- local free style dance

A Soft Kiss on a Broken Glass by Muhammad Kamran Fiaz
In cities,
Rain is a lover's whisper
In a village,
It's a soft kiss on a broken glass
Buffalo, cow, and a goat
that ami brought along in her dowry
Are waiting for the grass
Aba is worried,
With tomorrow,
That is always today,
Animals will be in the mud,
And the grass,
Too wet to cut and feed.
Baji ran,
From teaching math,
To the younger brother,
To secure the cage of parrot.
Ami told us
Baji studied,
Until fifth grade,
But she was always good,
with remembering the dates,
of funerals, weddings,
And the last day,
Of paying bills,
And fees.
Dadi
With her almost closed,
Eyes lined with kohl,
Sees the crows,
Circling and kraaing,
"Only a wedding in the rain."
Ami is looking,
At the Bougainville vine,
In the courtyard,
"Hummingbirds have made their nest over it"
Ami has told everyone,
like a secret.
She planted it,
In her early days of marriage,
When she used to watch
PTV dramas,
And they all had
Bougainville.
Growth of these plants
In the courtyard
Gives her the only
Sense of belonging
And ownership
In her home
That is of Aba.
Like everything else
And us
Known and called
by the name of aba.

Rain is like a thousand dreams by Susmita Ghosh
It is said, that nature is embedded in your soul
and on some days it caresses your existence, 
while in the others it consumes your leftovers.
I was thirteen when my grandmother
first read me a verse from "Meghdutam", 
that spoke about how the clouds in our Indian monsoon, 
carried messages from two estranged lovers. 
I was fascinated to know how the sky, 
who was my best friend as the loneliest child 
have secretly nurtured messengers in its bosom, 
while the rains, which were like my emotions, 
who were kept unexpressed for a long time 
had decided to bless barren lands and bare bodies, 
with the hope of life one day. 
Rain has always been my mother's enemy.
She cursed monsoons every year, 
as the feeble architecture of our house, 
sheltered raindrops within the cracks of its skin
with leaking ceilings and clogged drains in the attic, 
drowned her desires, wishes, and dreams
and my father stayed silent, 
quite like his promises in their relationship
while I hummed a verse from Miya ki Malhar 
"bijuri chamke jiyara tarse"
(My heart longed for the thunder to strike.) 
when, actually, my little heart only wanted to strike peace. 
I grew tired of clogged attics and messengers
but the rain kept on embracing my existence. 
It dripped through my uncombed hair, 
as I attended my first pride march 
and my flag soaked against my backbone
and my chest, 
making it difficult to differentiate between 
a human skin and a cloth made with revolution, 
while rainbows were born beneath the sky that day. 
Rain touched my eyelids as I cried, 
while returning home from a hard day at work
and it held my face, just like my alter ego does
to tell me "the thunders are temporary, flowers are permanent
and you can harness both"
My girlfriend tells me, 
কলকাতার বৃষ্টি সবচেয়ে সুন্দর
(The rains in Kolkata are the prettiest) 
and I agree with how they describe rain's 
ability to transform a person's heart. 
Yet at times, rain does have a heart of stone, 
to intrude through economic disparities
and create potholes, while flooding roofless lives
and sometimes it does save a sprout
in a country where crops are compared to gold. 
For me, rain is like a thousand dreams 
falling from the sky to touch their dreamers
and we, the children of a beautiful poem
wait for the rainbows to bloom in our lives.

I Was Not Named After a Peacock by Khatija Khan
Abandonment is the fluid
running in the veins of my city.
In its palms,
it holds her men and women
whose minds blossom into
uncountable rain harvesting methods-
tumblers on the terrace,
sprinklers in the fields,
earthen pots and whatnots
to celebrate the downpour.
Maa always collects a lot of water
but then abandons it, unknowingly.
Like every other child of the rain,
I too, was not named after a peacock.
There was music everywhere,
yet I could not dance enough.
I was left to sprout like soft moss.
Pa forgot to pick me
after my first day of school
so I searched for a shelter
with a tiny snail.
It took me longer than
the longest forever.
Every exhibition comes to a halt
in my city when the sky
arrives wearing its petrichor skirt
and rainbow sandals.
The earth swallows the aftermath
of the raindrops in no time
as the people living in small homes
curse the rain for snatching the sense
of belongingness from them.
The birds forget the windowsills
they took refuge upon as the sky roared.
Maa forgot me along with the
day I was born.
Yesterday I turned twenty.
My family will never know.
Like every other child of the rain,
I folded colorful papers into
origami paper boats and left them
to explore the narrow streets
full of small businesses panicking
about water pelting down
and seeping through their tents.
I chewed chalky jamuns
and looked at how they painted
my tongue purple.
As the rain broke into rivers
of chaos,
I broke into ponds of tears
in my room.
The government alerts the public
about probabilities of flood
almost every year.
Deaths never decrease
because the language
of rain on dissolving cities
is unknown to man.
Whoever tries to interpret
its path, loses himself.
Whoever tries to run away,
becomes one with it.
Rain and its children
contradict each other.
Like every other child of the rain,
I wore my raincoat
and tried to save my body
even though it was a liability
disguised as an asset.
Like every other child of the rain,
I couldn't master
the art of pouring
my feelings everywhere.
All I did was evaporate
and evaporate and evaporate
until one day, I became a grey cloud.
Some day,
I will fall over my city
and soak it in a fresh Ghazal.
Only when abandonment abandons it,
I will evaporate again.

About the Poets (In Order of the appearances of their poems):