In a limbo of desolate waters,
In the void of a flood-stricken plain,
You will find them--the sons and the daughters
Of tropical rain.
For when rivers are one with the ocean,
When the ricefields and roads are no more,
There's a feeling of magic, a notion
Of fairyland lore;
And the babies of Burma can revel
In a nursery of whirlpool and slime,
Where it thunders and rains like the devil
For weeks at a time.
They paddle their rafts through the jungle;
They swim through a network of leaves;
They clamber with never a bungle
To dive from the eaves.
'Tis an orgy of goblins, an image
Of nudity flouting the flood,
Of shorn-headed brownies who scrimmage
And splash in the mud.
As we row neath a tamarind, one'll
Roll off with a gesture of fright,
Bobbing up like a cork at our gunwale
And gurgling delight.
But never a stanza shall measure
The joy of that desperate crew
Of four-year-olds scouring for treasure
Astride a bamboo.
Their fathers smoke, huddled in sorrow,
Their mothers chew betel and fret,
And the pariahs howl for a morrow
Which shall not be wet;
The plovers wheel o'er them complaining,
And it's only the babies who pray
That the skies may be raining and raining
For ever and aye.