tears

On days when the thought of
being a ceiling to the world for any longer feels
impossible,
the sky cries.

On days when the clouds have hidden who
she thought she was and she
wonders if she was ever the
perfect blue everyone wanted her to be,
the sky cries.

On days when nothing goes right and
everyone is too far away to listen and
she feels too heavy with sorrow,
the sky cries, and she crys so hard
so much
because some days,
sunshine doesn't come easily
and she wants to give up, but
she isn't allowed to so
she cries and cries and
cries like a fallen child with a scraped knee.
She cries.

But unlike the scraped knee,
no one cares.
Her tears are an
inconvenience, and it's her fault that
field day was cancelled,
that the lights won't turn on
that their favorite shirt is wet.
Her tears are unlucky,
not something to be sad about,
only annoyed
grumpy
angry.
Her tears, in fact, aren't tears at all,
they're just bad weather,
and people get annoyed and grumpy and angry
or maybe they don't mind and turn away from the sky and
live without her sunshine.

But either way, they don't care.
The sky is
too far away,
too distant,
too non-human
to sympathize with.
No one cares.
No one.

Except.

the six-year-old down the street
running barefoot down wet concrete that
drips with water and what was once sidewalk chalk
running away and
throwing himself into the storm

the teenager in their room
lying on their bed with the door closed
staring up at the skylight
devoting themself to counting every drop that
pounds on the glass and then sadly
dribbles to a stop

the young woman on her front porch
reflecting the sky's sadness in her deep eyes as
she leans on the porch, enthralled,
letting her heart follow the rain
back up to the crying sky
where it all started.

And maybe they're comforting the sky
or maybe listening to her troubles
leaves their own sorrow behind them
but maybe it's neither
maybe they're
unscrewing the cap of their jar of sadness
releasing it out in the rain like fireflies
mixing up their sorrows with the sky's:
becoming one
because they care.