Rain on Main Street after dark
made the whole town look better than it was.
That sounds cruel.
It is not.
It is just true.
The cracked sidewalks went black and shining.
The drugstore sign bled red into the puddles.
The barber pole looked almost beautiful.
The courthouse windows turned soft.
Even the boarded place by the alley
got one good minute
where the rain laid a skin of light over its broken face
and made it seem like a place you could forgive.
I walked with my jacket open
and let the rain hit through my shirt.
There are ages when that feels noble.
Eighteen is one of them.
I had just had some little heartbreak
or some almost-heartbreak
or some drama I was calling heartbreak
to give it a richer sound.
I do not laugh at that now.
Small pain is huge pain
when you have not had the larger sizes yet.
The whole town looked like a song
trying not to admit it was a town.
I liked that.
I liked the lie and the truth of it together.
Same closed shops.
Same gossip stuck in every diner booth.
Same roads leading out and then back in.
Yet under rain and neon
it could pretend a little.
And I could too.
I think that is what I loved about night then.
It did not change things.
It made room for them to look like more.