Halfway Between

I was already carrying a bad number

when the sky opened up. Two blocks from shelter,

no umbrella—I ran. The kind of summer

rain that bounces, the whole street a welter

of it. I made it to a closed laundromat,

stood under the narrow overhang, soaked.

The number still going. The rain on the flat

roof above me. The gutter choked

with a plastic bag turning in the current.

The overhang dripped in a solid line

at the edge. I stood. Twenty minutes. Weren't

going to clear it. Weren't going to realign

the thing I'd been adding and subtracting

all day. The storm didn't care.

I watched the bag. I watched the refracting

white of the rain on the concrete. The air

smelled like asphalt and ozone.

When it stopped, I walked out. Still wet.

The number still the number, alone

in my head. Not fixed. Not yet.