There is fire on the mountain this morning, and barely a cloud in sight.
Oh, they’ll build up as the day progresses; by noon, they’ll look much like the image above, taken on an early summer’s day some seven years ago. But those are not the clouds that carry rain.
To the west, a couple of small thunderheads are hard at work, trying to puff themselves up into something capable of blowing down much more than a ouse, straw or brick alike. But they have much work to do before they will earn the title and trappings of the storm.
Meanwhile, it’s a new moon: What is, to my people, either the Berry Moon or the Halfway-Summer Moon, depending on where one lives. Halfway-summer is perhaps a given — or not; the ravages of climate change have made our seasons not merely unpredictable but unwilling to be bound by pattern or time — but there is scarcely a berry to be had here now. But the moon is not what rules our days, and a merciless sun bakes the earth beneath the heat of its unrelenting gaze. The clouds are welcome now for more than just whatever water they might hold.
But the water is needed now, more desperately than ever. The fire on the mountain is, in all likelihood, the result of a lightning strike, a bolt that accompanied yesterday’s storm. But in this drought, the forest is a giant sloping tinderbox, with deep roots and intermittent high winds to carry the fire far and wide. “Spreading like wildfire” is not just an expression here; it’s a very real and present danger, one that too often comes up close and personal.
And so we pray. Wings’s niece noticed the plume and called him early; he in turn reported it to the War Chief’s staff. Two hours later, the helicopter was on its way, where it spent the better part of an hour circling over the site, seeking a better fix on dimension and range even as it fought the up- and downdrafts of the alpine wind currents. There is work to be done this day, but this thirsty, bone-dry land needs more than mere mortals can give it now.
To the west, the thunderheads are finally coalescing into something that might achieve critical mass. Such smaller clouds as those in the image above dance now above the peaks, of little help as they are but susceptible to a larger cooperative effort. Does the sun dream of surrendering space to the rain? Does the moon conspire with the clouds of a night?
We have no way of knowing what the spirits have in mind. But for us, in this dry and desolate heat? We are praying for the rain.
~ Aji
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