Weekly Skylights: The Tripod Looks to the Clouds

Joey Cifelli ’23

Arts Editor

October 12, 2021 

The rain comes down. Nighttime, the end of October. The rain falls into a divot in the asphalt path. The buildings downtown are so close you don’t need an umbrella if you’re quick. If you are a person that minds the rain. Many do not. They walk on the sidewalk with coats, some of these people who do not mind the rain, and they keep their collars down instead of up. Rain leaves a different mark on the skin than sweat does. Is it less reflective? Is it colder? The people who get wet in the rain pass me by, never knowing I saw them. If they knew would they be glad? Sometimes I can barely restrain myself from throwing open my window and shouting Hello, and inviting them in. Because I can not absolutely not think of anything worse than what I’m doing now. 7.8/10 

October 13, 2021 

Another rainy night. The super called. Three days to the end. That’s my limit. Three days to get my dues in. What he’s owed. Or I’ll regret that. But Sir, I say, real cool, I’ve never felt better. Why, I can take my friends out to dinner, my treat, and tip real well. I show up to gatherings in nice suits and the people let me know. I come home from a night on the town, kick my feet up on my bed, and I smoke a cigar of such high caliber I pick the smoke out of my teeth with a toothpick three days past. These Benefits, I say, these absolute Benefits you would deprive me of with my dues? My life is bigger than it has ever been, Sir, because of this simple reallocation of funds. My name means something. Maybe, I suggest, maybe you take a few days to think about what you really want to do. Think about what kind of person you really want to be. Or, Sir, you can better believe that you will regret that. I put the phone down. 8.9/10 

October 14, 2021 

I sit here, in my room. A rain drop collides with another and slides down the glass, gaining speed, until it inevitably intersects another droplet and bursts ahead, hitting drops at an accelerating rhythm, practically exponential leaps in speed, sliding, until the point of no return arrives on the horizon, the sill’s edge, where the bloated drop races toward oblivion with the storm at its back, a sliver before the cusp, a speck, an infinitesimal. I blink. An hour passes. Once again my body has deprived me of a transcendental experience. This old thing. It does nothing for me. I feel as though I got it used, at a garage sale, for nothing, and I still paid too much. The rain taps against the window, useless now. I buy furniture to house my wrecked self. I admit that it is comfortable. The sunlight drains into the gutters. 8.1/10 

October 15, 2021 

The rain let up today. The streets have that wet lacquered finish that stays for just a few minutes after the sun comes out. Autumn this time of year, and the light is still cold. I ate my toast and put on my coat and took a step out of my room. I walked down the stairs. The air was sharp and a little bitter. I took a walk to the park. I fed the pigeons. Green and gray and blue pigeons, dozens of them, pecking at stale crusts and my shoes, occasionally. I wonder where they go when it rains. I confess despite everything I like the rain. I stay in my room, wait it out, dry and viscerally clear how close a soak is. It soothes my ears and my eyes, all of them thin and tattered. The weather closes a curtain over the outside that makes it easy to sleep without pain or worry. For a moment every night, one moment as I drift off, I do not know my age. I wonder where they go, these birds. I wonder if they’re alone. 7.2/10