Wish
Neil Cunningham

I wanted to work in a movie studio
with a rain machine
and make it rain all day
any day any time I liked

I’d make a misty Cuban landscape
or a Bombay monsoon
by pressing a blue button
by turning a dial
I’d micromanage rain
until it was the perfect intensity
until the rain-drops were just the right size
and falling just so

I even dreamed of being a Rain God
and having full control over the entire rain spectrum
and other related forms of weather
until one day
a rain technician explained
they’re not worth the trouble rain machines
the water goes stale in tanks
the mineral deposits are a bitch
and you have to constantly add salt
or the sprinkler nozzles clog

And not only that she said
it’s pathetic the way people act
around a rain machine
how perfectly healthy people collapse
over scripted Love
drenched by calibrated sprinklers
when there’s no fire

Real rain from a real sky she said
there’s nothing like it