Lightning is lavender.
The soft kind purple
of bathtime; and blankets.

It belies the coming roar,
the wave,
which rolls us around in the crest
and retreats,
as we clutch our breath and ears
and wonder, should we do this?

Setting off,
the ocean floating above our heads
dis-integrates,
the whole thrown down in uncountable miniatures;
descending miles in precise lines
to hit the drumskin of the car, your parka,
my bald head,
to play a tune.

A stream crossing,
swollen with warm shower,
fills our boots and seeps our clothes,
rising above the crotches of our legs.
On the other shore we doff everything
to tramp unconcerned through mud and puddles,
dripping trees.
We can only get so wet.

How could I forget,
the round fullness of a toad,
contented in the rain.

We raced the storm to the summit
futily, it had won long before we arrived.
Our last grasps upon the stone were met
by a cool breeze to dry our hair
and make us shudder, huddle, listening,
to the storm bounce among the ancient hills,
casting us in lavender.

In the new thick heat of descent
the sweat tickled the tips of our noses as it fell
from our giggling faces,
satisfied to have lost with each other,
and from slipping to our asses.

How could I forget,
in six short months,
the stomach knot of apprehension
in approaching the waterfall.
The desire to push in and through the wall of water,
to bring you with me, and drive the dirt and oil
off our sunburnt shoulders.
To shout at its coldness,
and then plow through again.

Sitting, finally, by the fire
hot coffee and tinned pasta in our hands,
our lizard selves emerge
and consider the people arriving now, too late
to have been wrapped in lavender.