Poem for Sunday and Richmond Flowers

April Rain Song
By Langston Hughes

Let the rain kiss you
Let the rain beat upon your head with silver liquid drops
Let the rain sing you a lullaby
The rain makes still pools on the sidewalk
The rain makes running pools in the gutter
The rain plays a little sleep song on our roof at night
And I love the rain.

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We have been in Richmond all day! We went to the VMFA with Cheryl to see Van Gogh, Manet, and Matisse: The Art of the Flower, a history of 19th century French still life floral painting, not knowing that it was Springtime in Paris day with lots of floral-related activity for kids plus puppets, jugglers, and other entertainments. After eating lunch in the restaurant there (coconut ginger soup FTW), we went to Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, where we went to see the Butterflies Live in the conservatory, then had a lovely but very damp walk among the rainy tulips, azaleas, dogwoods, and many other flowers, plus the occasional heron and turtle! We had intended to go to Maymont to see the Japanese garden there, but it was raining so hard when we arrived that we only walked around the upper formal garden, which also has many flowers (plus we got to see another heron down in the lower garden from the overlook).













We had a minor crisis because our car's tire pressure light came on, but putting some air in seemed to take care of the problem, so we had dinner with Cheryl at Mexico Restaurant before driving home in rain and fog. We saw the very bizarre end of the Orioles game, which they ultimately won, though the mayor of Baltimore had asked that everyone remain in the stadium during the final innings because the protests against the police outside were threatening to turn into a riot, and it really looked for a few minutes like the O's had deliberately blown a couple of plays to tie the game in the 9th so that fans would stay in their seats. Baltimore is still looking scary tonight, but of course nothing is as awful as the photos coming out of Kathmandu (and how typical of the U.S. news that most of the focus is on Americans who died in the avalanche on Everest rather than the thousands of Nepalis who died). Hopefully tomorrow there will be better news.