This is in response to a prompt from Aimee Nezhukumatathil’s webinar Nature as Inspiration and Transformation: An Intro to Nature Poetry: keep a cloud journal.
Cloud Report, 23 May
to the west
over the half-grey half-white peaks
the clouds levitated in bands
closest to earth, they upwelled
like the hair on the back of your neck
when something’s not right –
a bland diffuse mass at the base
culminated in a fine tomentose top
then a band of blue
overlaid with a thin stripe of ethereal cirrus
you know, the cloud of harp glissandos
and then in the foreground
a small puff of cumulus
it was spring
with all the fickle shifting light and heat
that comes with waking
to the south, the sky collapsed in grey over the ridge
promising (insincerely, it seems) rain
and I sat on the small naked knoll
a meter or two above the last chest-high aspens
and congratulated myself
for having walked my body above
the enclosing dark-green forest
straight up into the blue
where I could have a word with the sky on my own
and the word was
yes
