Breathe

Remember in elementary school
and our teachers stood in front of us with their broadening smiles
and their dreaded note cards
and they told us to take out our books and write in cursive...

Cursive
flowing cursive, one letter, after another, after another
they all line up like disciplined soldiers in single file
ready to move so fast and so furiously that they don't even have time to put on their hats...
No breathing! You can't breathe until the word ends...
Breathing's boring, don't bother breathing, just keep going...

But...
Maybe once in a while
we should stop.

Just stop,

To notice the engravings on the pavement
and the fine print beneath our shoes.

Maybe just once
we should
pause
and realize that the sky wasn't made just to rain.
It was made to breathe.