In Japan, they have festivals for the cherry blossoms each spring. Here in California, it doesn’t rain for months and then, suddenly, does. So I think we need a First Rain Festival. We could have hot food and umbrella dances, boot splash puddles, green drinks, sing rain songs and recite poems about rain. And even though this poem is about 100 years old and about summer rain, it seems relevant:
Summer Rain
All night our room was outer-walled with rain.
Drops fell and flattened on the tin roof,
And rang like little disks of metal.
Ping!—Ping!—and there was not a pin-point of silence between
them.
The rain rattled and clashed,
And the slats of the shutters danced and glittered.
But to me the darkness was red-gold and crocus-colored
With your brightness,
And the words you whispered to me
Sprang up and flamed—orange torches against the rain.
Torches against the wall of cool, silver rain!
Amy Lowell