Jones Rain

“Here daddy, this is your stick and this is mine. We will drag them through the rocks!”

We drag the sticks along the sidewalk. Jones is a shark, I am a laser beam. Earlier he was an astronaut robot dancing to Toots and the Maytals. He is a shape shifter. A shaman. A spirit guide constantly forming and reforming, announcing himself to the world in all his various guises.

A young Asian woman attired in perfectly executed variations of pink passes by. Focused on the phone before her, she does not see us. A ghost floating through the humid day. As real as a cloud. Jones drops his stick and runs into some bushes. He is drawn to every green thing. All the branches, all the leaves, all the flowers, all the replicating versions living within–everything different, everything the same. And he rummages for a minute before emerging with three tiny snail shells cupped in his hands. His eyes so blue, so big.

He knows this is a miracle.

“This one is the daddy, this one is mommy and this one is Jonesy.

Something happens to the weather and it begins to spit and we are beneath a tree, the sound of water drops falling on the leaves above.