Rainmakers

Now at last the rains have come!

We hear and feel the thrum

from our under-sand abode,

and we emerge, horns quivering,

glorying in the sublime wetness,

the pouring down of Love,

the blessing, the manna

from above.

Time to celebrate,

time for a bacchanal!

For we who have so long abstained,

even decomposing plants

are an imposing meal,

and the hundreds of eggs,

born of our transcendent couplings,

must become the geniuses and saints

of our species.

When the clouds clear, we know

our party's end is near.

Nibbling the plants we've learned

will extend our ecstasy,

we rejoice in the revelry,

ascending to the singing stars,

the moon's radiant face.

Come morning, we are back in place,

hunkered down underground

and moving into the long sleep,

cocooned in the womb of darkness,

safe from the relentless sun.

We, the sacred snails,

are the rainmakers

of the desert.

To you, our sleeping life

may seem a living death,

but our dreams of blessed water

go forth into the Field

from which all emerges,

seeding the clouds

with our visions,

birthing into righteous rain

for all flowing, growing things.

Awake or asleep, we live our dreams.

Death? We do not fear it,

we know that we live on in Love,

born again of water and the spirit.