the sound of thunder

So strange it seems to me now to hear the sound of thunder.
A sound almost comforting, like the dull drowsy ache of a hunger.
So strange it seems to hear that sound
Which once evoked from me such an intolerable fear-
Now to which I can listen in peace.
What a hope it lights in me, however small;
For I miss the days when my worst fear was something so concrete,
So real as a thunderstorm.
But knowing that even this can fade,
What once threatened can become beautiful to me,
This fills me with a gloomy kind of joy.
Gloomy from the dark and damp of a rainy day,
But joyful for how it causes the street to shine-
The rain on this path that I walk.
So that maybe what is terror in me today
Will become fragrant to me by the rain's growth of flowers.
This too shall pass, as the rolling of the thunder-
The roaring in my heart.