Lightning Flashes; Thunder Rolls

Right on time, almost as though scheduled, October first, the autumnal rains arrived. Sunday morning I awoke to the sound of rain. It was a passing shower. When I went out to see the sunrise it was beginning to clear, but I could still see the rain falling from the clouds above.

Yesterday morning I was wakened by lightning and thunder and the sounds of rain pouring down. Water was running in the street. Again, it didn't last long. The clouds were rolling away. Sunrise was coloring them pink.

There is rain in the forecast again today. The sun had already gone down last evening when I saw this contrail streaking across the dusky sky. It reminded me of one of my favorite poems, High Flight by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

"Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth,
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed and joined the tumbling Mirth of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred Things you have not dreamed of - 
Wheeled and soared and swung high in the sunlit silence.
Hovering there I've chased the shouting wind along
And flung my eager craft through footless halls of air.

Up, up the long delirious burning blue
I've topped the wind-swept heights with easy grace,
Where never lark, or even eagle, flew;
And, while with silent, lifting mind I've trod
The high untrespassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God." 

Magee was an American citizen who joined the Royal Canadian Air Force to become a pilot. He was sent to England for combat duty in 1941. In December that year his Spitfire collided with another plane over England and he was killed in the crash. He was 19 years old.
I remember his poem being used after the Challenger disaster in 1986. It was especially poignant at that time.

The fall rains are welcome. The clouds will make for more interesting sunrise and sunset photos. Jet trails may add to them, as they often do in my pictures. And I will enjoy awakening to lightning, thunder and the sound of rain on the roof.