A Drop at the Leaf's Tip

Morning raindrops fall on the lotus leaves and roll. Slowly along the veins, and sideways too, pushed by the drops that keep falling. I watched that movement from the edge of the pond for a long time. My sleeves were already wet, and with both hands resting on my knees, I decided on nothing at all. There was someone sitting on a bench by the pond with their sleeves rolled up. Even after the rain stopped, they stayed there a good while. The pond's surface holds a gray sky between the leaves, and beneath it lie sunken stones and reclining weeds. The raindrops simply cross over them. From that bench, I was waiting for the moment a drop clinging to a leaf's tip would fall. While the surface drew its circle and settled, that person stayed in the same place too. The rain stopped a while later, but the drops on the lotus leaves keep moving along their own paths. When a drop clinging to a leaf's tip falls and touches the surface, the pond gains one more circle spreading out from that spot.