Citizenship Class In autumn drizzle I wonder what it means for students who have come from hot, dry lands, if they will learn to love the way of it, the swathes of cloud and monochrome, the grey-hatched beauty of wet and misty swirls, westerly gales. Faridah will have to pass the test or be sent home to marry a second or third – how many are there? – cousin. Mahmoud, with a family to support, is desperate to return to dentistry and make his way with cavities and crowns. All of them have chosen to be here if choice it is: they flow randomly, irregularly as raindrops trickling down a window on paths that dust and chance initiate, tensions on a surface or within. No matter, for there's joy in this strange merging of all weathers in a front of hopefulness, even in the parting as the clouds, too, depart. Already they reflect the light in all directions, raindrop citizens.