Canvas of Blue Sky

Earth’s chiffon scarf
Everlastingly changed
Being stretched along this blue canvas of eternity
God
With his giant paintbrush
Never running out
On this cerulean ceiling
Of the sky

Freddie (aged 9)
St John’s College School, Cambridge, UK
(you can also read the other poems by pupils from St John’s College School)

in Croydon, Surrey, UK

Staring

Cocoons of changing
Animals or
images from
Childhood nightmares
Faces unseen
Since family days out
Zoo like mess
Depravity in white
I stare skywards
Eyes crinkled
Sunlight hidden for moments
Before I stream salt tears
Wince in pain
At jumbled elephants
Tigers and dolphins
Gliding into trains
Sliding downwards
Into blanks
And shapeless
Wisps of
Vapour

© Frances Roberson.

Kangaroo Cloud

Starkly on pale blue,
bleached sun, cloud blotched,
puffy white fluffy flumps,
statically sit,
in azure stable.

A single cloudlet,
singlet white perfect ,
thinned then fogged,
then volume vanished;
a pace away,
re-thickens.

A gust then weaves,
a kangaroo shape,
its tail wind wagging,
then slow float,
to mist as if,
to graze on gossamer,
then haze again,
back into ether.
© mountain fog August 2008

Cloud Vessel

I wrote at noon — till few seconds before
I was staring at such a spectacular manifestation
of clouds’ morphing in their vivid own life —
I shifted my gaze over to the landscape outside
my bedroom’s window which looks towards north-east.

I really saw something magic — a very form
of life made of steam and air in the sky.
It’s moving slowly but its furtherance was
clearly visible, appreciable — what was it?
A single autonomous storm that was travelling on its skyway.

An indipendent organism of pulsating steam:
white and sharp in the front-end with subtle aerial tentacles
of nearly immaterial whiteness — dark grey and dense
in the back-end where a real propeller, an airscrew
of atmospheric proportion’s rotating regularly
in a geometry of vaporous and thick blades.

A vessel of clouds navigating along routes of highness and open space.
It proceeded in its flyabout disturbed by neither other clouds nor winds,
by neither mountains that rise and cover the eastern horizon nor the city’s skyline.
It had its own well-drawn profile, contours easy to focus with the naked-eye.

I’ve followed this sailing airship up to its disappearing
into the indistinct canvas of fading grey steam in the long distance.
It has kept his well-refined and recognizable shape — always.
A journeyer, perhaps a visitor (i do suppose), from a clouds’ realm…

© Esteban HH Trillo

Delle nubi
incedono
gli adoratori

nel torpore
di case
eteree

© Esteban H H Trillo

Dreams.

Every once in a while
elements plot
in the steam
of someone’s sight.

And there grows something so fragile
that it becomes transparent.

It is so transparent
that one can take a deep glance.

An in the depths it is white…
so white
that it’s simply pure.

Every once in a while
throw your heart
to the sky,
a dream
could be
ready to condense.

© Ernesto Vargas Rueda

Sunset

In the blue canvas of the sky
Painted with blue and white
Bright feathers of the sky, slashed with pink
Suspended in light
Riding in the colourful space
I am the artist of the world

Ellie (aged 9)
St John’s College School, Cambridge, UK
(you can also read the other poems by pupils from St John’s College School)

The God Box

Clouds,
in a thousand shades of gray and blue,
purple and cream and palest peach,
some rolled long like bats of wool,
others thrusting like tufts of fur plucked upwards,
some clumped like great fistfuls of cottonballs,
others feathered into mare‚s-tails combed thin by the wind,
some spun into smooth sheets of satin,
others still in little rills like waves coming in,
or scalloped like seashells and fishes‚ scales,
all seen in a single sky,
as if God had gotten to the bottom of Her craft-box
and decided to use up all the loose ends at once.

Colors of the Heart

There‚s a kind of hope that lifts your heart
On wings that cannot fray
Like the color of a morning sky
That‚s turning toward the day
There‚s a kind of freedom in the mind
Through which all can be done
Like the color of an eggshell sky
Around a summer sun
There‚s a kind of grief that holds you close
And makes friends with the pain
Like the color of a cloudy sky
That‚s dreaming of the rain
There‚s a kind of dark excitement with
A savage ancient song
Like the color of an autumn sky
Whose winds blow cold and strong
There‚s a kind of vision in the soul
That sees from far to soon
Like the color of a clear night sky
That holds a waning moon
There‚s a kind of fury in the blood
That beats the battle drums
Like the color of a stormy sky
Before the blizzard comes
There‚s a kind of easy peace that takes
You down in sweet repose
Like the color of an evening sky
That‚s shedding all her clothes
There‚s a kind of love that lights your way
Although its time is past
Like the color of a predawn sky
That breaks night‚s hold at last

© Elizabeth Barrette

closer than breath through a telescope,
dreams lie in wait.

blessed impermanence writ,
up there,
a bit.

(Glimpsing clouds, uptown New Orleans, April 2006)

Dallas, Texas, US.

At the sculpture

at the sculpture on a sunday afternoon,
in the dream
of terrell’s square screen,
tending (to feel)
blue

Quantum Cloud looks like a load of blown sticks,
stuck to some bloke
on a hill,
near stoke

like the slag at heron cross,
or near the pub*
in penkhull.

© Duncan Edwards
(11-12-06)

*The Jolly Potters pub.

Nevada, US.

Untitled

reflected puffy dabs,
floating on metal
windscreen
and her sunglasses

an old photograph,
blue desert sky
rented silver cadillac
unrented happy girl

© Duncan Edwards
(July 1992, Nevada)

Nevada US.

Poem

Reflected puffy dabs,
floating on metal
windscreen
and her sunglasses

an old photograph,
blue desert sky
rented silver cadillac
unrented happy girl

© Duncan Edwards.

Canberra, Australian Capital Territory,
Australia.

Lenticular Heaven

Too many days, ground tied and cluttered,
Complicated by officialdom and bureaucracy;
Surrounded by people who simply know not
The power and majesty of what they see;
So many longing gazes, through office windows,
At welcoming skies, Brindabella Ranges sparkling, shining;
Under sweeping lenticular bars, smooth skirts flowing,
Across powerful winds, cumulus rotor forming, dissolving.
Oh, how I want to touch this sky.

Launched at last, tug towline released,
Supported by long white wings, cool oxygen flowing even;
I am soaring in smoothest laminar flow,
Sailplane surging higher into our lenticular heaven.
We dance and sweep the leading edge, always windward,
Our shadow caressed by rainbow halo bright,
As lenticular curves flow across the escarpments,
Warm brilliant sun casting a crystalline light.
Oh, how I love the touch of this sky.

Delicious moments, when my soul escapes
The constraints of mortal working life,
My mind recalls the wave, the precious sensations
With awareness enhanced, feeling truly alive.
The lenticular backdrop frames the landscape with beauty,
Frost crystals on white wings curve a glistening arc;
I am at one with the sailplane, with the air in this heaven,
And my existence, my meaning, is renewed by this spark.
My love of life has been touched by this sky.

© Drew McKinnie
September 2007

Ashford, Middlesex, UK.

How I became a Cloudspotter

I was pedalling my bicycle along a country lane,
Quite oblivious to the sky above my head,
When a shout went up, “That cloud, sir! That cloud, sir! Look up there!”
And I brought my cycle to a stop quite dead.
Alas, I had forgotten ancient lessons learned at school,
Newton’s laws about inertia ‘mongst the pile.
And continuing on my journey whilst my bicycle stood still,
I sailed through empty air with silly smile.
Descending to the tarmac in an exponential arc,
Like a diagram from some artillery book,
I landed with a bump upon the unforgiving turf,
But thought that while I’m here, I’ll take a look.
But oh, the giddy whirling that did greet my star-filled eyes,
Everything went round and round my aching head.
And whilst recalling visions from my dim and feckless youth,
I was placed upon an ambulance’s bed.
Upon discharge from hospital, I went back to the scene,
Of this mishap caused by someone’s hasty fuss,
And looking at the sky to see what all the noise was for,
I was greeted by a flock of Cumul-us.
‘Twas wondrous to behold this glorious vision of a cloud,
As it sailed across the heavenly expanse,
But looking up like this gave me a right pain in the neck,
So I lay amongst the beetles and the ants.
Alas, I had not reckoned on the man who gave the shout,
Returning to the scene as I had done.
He thought I was a speed bump as he drew up in his car,
A vehicle which must have weighed a ton.
So the ambulance was called for once again to pick me up,
And rush me to the local A&E,
Where, ‘pon my due arrival, they worked hard to stitch me up,
And repair my painful neck and injured knee.
They warned me of the perils of gazing up into the sky,
(Quite needlessly, I thought, but there we are).
And they sent me home with collar surgical upon my neck,
So my head was held in perpendicular.
At least that was the theory, but their plan had come unstuck,
For you see, they had not read the bulletin,
That was issued at the hospital on my obesity,
They had not reckoned on my double chin.
With my chins upon the collar surgical that I now wear,
My line of sight is now on upward track,
Ideal, I think, for spotting clouds without strain to the neck,
And since wearing it I never have looked back.
So perfectly inclined I am to view the cloudy scene,
And completely unable to see the ground,
Well, if I’d been a botanist I’d really be depressed,
But with spotting clouds my joy may now abound.

© Dr Wm R Cooper, Member 5000.

Peace Harvest

On a country walk
you can grasp whole handfuls of fresh, clean air;
or gather up the birdsong in great bunches,
throwing it this way and that
as you flick your head from side to side.

The skidding plane of the blue vault
frightens you, and makes you cower in vertigo
as (lying on your back) you plunge deeply in.

Do you remember the times
when you could have reached up
and squashed a cloud,
letting it freeze your palms
as it dribbled through your fingers?

You, who flipped at such a thought,
who found your troubled edges smoothed away,
return to people-squeezing your days on.

“Enough” cries the country,
and weeps its merry heart away.

© Dr Stephen Castell

Amid the daffodils I roamed
And stared as far as space allowed
When all at once I saw a domed
high-soaring silver cloud

Dianella Bardelli of Bologna, Italy recently sent us her Cloud Haiku

Cielo al tramonto
un’allucinazione
di rosso e sangue
……………………….
Poche le nubi
sopra il mare cobalto –
sfioriscon lente
………………………
Nubi di notte
le illumina la luna –
diventan grigie
……………………..
C’è anche il giallo
nel rosso dell’aurora –
diventa rosa

© Dianella Bardelli

From Selva Malvezzi, Italy

Some Italian Poetry

Due cieli
Se guardo il cielo azzurro del mattino
e poi gli occhi li chiudo
m’appare un cielo blu, scuro e segreto-
è fatto di cartone ed è animato
come quei libri che se li apri
la favola è di carta ritagliata
diventa fondale dipinto e personaggi –
così è il mio cielo ad occhi chiusi
più blu, forse più bello
ma di cartone

5,30 del mattino
Ai lati della tenda
filtra una luce d’alba –
mi colpisce il biancore
di là dal vetro freddo –
è la luna che alta volge in basso
il suo sguardo muto e velato –
recondita e lontana
separata, sola, senz’anima,
persa nell’infinito cielo

© Dianella Bardelli

from Selva Malvezzi, Italy

Banco di nubi

Banco di nubi-
la sua riva frastagliata e fragile
taglia a metà
il mare calmo del cielo-

è una linea bianca
misteriosa e chiusa,
un alto scrigno vaporoso-

di sicuro nasconde misteri
visioni
miracoli
angeli
madonne bianche e azzurre
divinità solleciti
custodi tutti degli umani destini
e portatori
di messaggi preziosi

ma forse
è solo la sera primaverile
di un giorno strano
in coda
tra macchine e persone
troppo stanche e annoiate
per alzare lo sguardo
alla bellezza
fragile e assoluta
del cielo
immaginando e sperando
semplice un segno

Scherzi della luce

Si specchia
si moltiplica il sole
mentre la neve
piano piano
o velocemente
gela o si scioglie-
si sdoppia
si moltiplica
in pallide nubi replicanti
che mutano se stesse
il una striscia
lunga di luce-
non ci accorgiamo mai
dei veri mutamenti

Tre macchie in cielo

Primo mattino-
tre macchie di celeste
a ingentilire il cielo-
un’impressione d’azzurro
ma non di spazio,
coperto, ristretto
da nubi spesse e nebbia-
le macchie chiare hanno un potere,
aprono gli occhi ancorché
assonnati, annoiati
senza attesa di sorprese
da questi giorni grigi-
questo celeste che illumina
diventa allora
il mantello dei santi
o lo sfondo di Tangka
antichi e misteriosi
o quello di mistiche annunciazioni
o l’apertura su colline
di dipinti italiani
o il perfetto cielo
della città ideale-
queste tre piccole aperture azzurre
correggono l’umore neutro
lo mutano in un momento, vero,
d’allegria

© Dianella Bardelli, 2010

an English translation of the German poem sent in by Maximilan Kleibeler

They fly up and down, to and fro,
Go all over the world.

Now light, now dark, now light, now heavy,
And sometimes on a lake of colour.

Now we see them as tigers, now as dragons,
And also sometimes soaring up
From a person’s throat.

Sometimes they pull themselves apart, sometimes as beautiful as poetry;
Sometimes they cast spells, like magic.

You can love them, you can’t hate them,
One thing is certain, you can’t do without them.

You observe that they are immortal, like it or not;
So they belong to life, as light does.

© Debra Wetherell.

Torino (Italy)

CLOUDSPOTTING

I observe the veils flowing
Between us and the mount of gods
Yun that is
The union of Yin and Yang

If I live life
With my heads in the clouds
It’s not because
Of the western blue-sky thinking
Of some cloudless monotony

I don’t judge anyone
I only observe the veils dancing
Between us and the mount of gods
And see anything created
Under the ever changing shapes of all

I see
The ever changing existance
Apparent as ephemeral beauty
Or horrors

Call me cloudspotter or an idler
Le flaneur like Baudelaire
Clouds are not for dreamers only

But a way of living careful
Of ever changing feelings
And thinking and seeming reality
To benefit the experience of
An ever changing soul

I want to see the risen Christ
In the doomsday
When he comes in a cloud
With power and glory

© Davide Riccio.

I’d like to shout it really loud
“Yippie, yippie. I’m a cloud”
And line the blue sky up and down
Like a meadow newly ploughed
But I’m not and never will be
Such thoughts are really silly

So instead I sit and admire the view
If I wished upon a cloud
Would you wish the same wish too?

They scene change, never discolouring the sky’s stage
Amuse, bruise, goad our optimism and threaten us…

Bournemouth

Oh,what a joy it is to see the clouds
Moving across the sky
And as they move they capture the hearts
Of watchers like you and I

It seems to me that life itself
Is mirrored by them too
And as they pass so quickly
There s a keener need to view

They change their shape and colour
And give us food for thought
Sometimes they look like objects
Or people,so quickly they must be caught

No doubt the break of day or sunset
Give clouds true majesty
When colours heighten the effect
And make them memorable to see

And so it is that clouds provide
Us with a moving panoply
With such ever-changing moods
That we are thrilled to see

© David Lindsley 2009.

Bournemouth U.K.

Clouds.

A cloud is a thing of beauty
A wonder to behold
It brings to all a sense of joy
As its many facets unfold

Its moods can be solemn and angry
Or welcoming and bright
Such are the changes we can see
From morning until night

Cumulus,Cirrus and Stratus are names we use
To describe them one from another
But earthly objects can be seen that infuse
A desire to capture them for ever

Sunrise and sunset can heighten the effect
Of clouds that pass above
And we can hold our heads erect
To marvel at colours we love

But most of all, mood reigns supreme
As clouds evolve and change
Reflected in our lives it would seem
Not something we can arrange

And so it is that we admire
Their beauty and their power
Of which spectrum we do not tire
Nor count the day or hour.

© David Lindsley. 2008.

Emotions

If emotions had shape,
they’d look like clouds.

Happiness would wander across deep blue.
Small and fluffy
with no grey hue,
just bright and white
and light with the joy of it all.

Sadness would be dull and flat,
Covering all with deadpan still.
Heavy and low.
An oppressive pall
that stills and removes the reason for all.

Anger would billow up mighty and high,
both screaming white and threatening black.
Flashing and roaring
and threatening the world,
diminishing all in it’s track.

Love would be smeared across calm grey blue
like watercolour smudged with tears.
With tints of orange, pink and red
as the fiery sun finally calms
and leaves us to be content.

Hatred would be roiling low
with turbulent tones of black and grey.
Rumbling past at tree top height,
spitting and glowering
and dulling the light.

Jealousy would be hazy and thin.
Oppressive, confusing with Turner sun
corrupting the light,
distorting our sight
and leaving truth limpid.

Compassion would settle gentle and still.
A quiet white mist
on the valleys and hills
and cause us to stop
and consider the ills of the world.

Hope would be high and textured and white.
Bright lacy ribbons stretched across blue.
Threads of potential
with definite shape
that hold new promise of change in the wind.

Fear would be fog, silent and dark.
Obscuring the truth, sly moving stillness,
drifting around us to get round behind us.
Sinister spirits that steal our judgement
and make us like fools, lost.

[© David Kitching 2005]

Mindclouds

There’s something that drives me
to want something
more than what I have.

In considering what my life
amounts to,

I see a cloud that set out to be
a majestic thing that strode
across landscapes.

But it was waylaid.
and merely drizzled

and became fog that did nothing
more than obscure.
I didn’t want that.

But wanting makes what is
and sets us our challenge.

And when we fail,
as we certainly will, we learn

to see how now is what we are
and not some vision of what might be.

Some bulbous cumulus that
thinks to force the world to be
and then blows itself out.

We are more drifting nimbus
that can quietly watch
and no more.

[© David Kitching 2006]

Dalle nuvole è caduta una pioggia intense

Aveva una nuvola di capelli ricci e scuri

Una nube di paura incombeva sui rifugiati

Si vede che ama il suo ragazzo dallo sguardo sul suo viso

si è mangiato un pollo intero

© David Jenkins

Newcastle upon Tyne, U.K.

THROUGH THE NIGHT – AUTUMN 2001

The moon’s beam drew-out,
White, a passing curly-cloud
From the inky sky.

© David Franks/WalkaboutsVerse 2003

Newcastle upon Tyne, UK

ABOVE EVEREST

When flying from Nepal to Thailand,
I was given a “good-side” seat;
And, as I looked out the plane window,
The view I saw was really neat.

For breaking through a thick sheet of cloud
Were the high Himalayan peaks;
And, rising the highest of them all,
Mount Everest – heaven bespeaks!

© David Franks/WalkaboutsVerse 2003

Newcastle Upon Tyne, UK

NIGHT OR DAY?!

In the far north of Sweden,
A “Land of the Midnight Sun,”
A strange thing chanced upon me –
And I’ll tell you, just for fun.

Got off a train late-morning
(Had to catch same one next day)
And trudged far to the Youth Hostel –
Paying for a one-night stay.

I spent the afternoon sightseeing,
Then, after a latish dinner,
Returned to my own small bedroom –
The comfy bed proving a winner.

For I soon dozed into dreamy sleep –
Waking what was just two hours hence;
But my watch was an analogue,
And night or day I couldn’t sense!

I quickly packed all my things
(My train an hour or thirteen on)
And hurried out the bedroom –
The bright sky a sneaky con.

I wandered down the track a bit
(The Hostel office empty),
Before a smiling helpful local
Did kindly enlighten me.

(C) David Franks/WalkaboutsVerse 2003

Newcastle upon Tyne. U.K.

SKY VIEWS – AUTUMN 2000

From a council-flat in Bury,
Through a wide window, I see –
Landing on neighboring tiles –
Some starlings, pied wagtails,
The hop of magpie and sparrow;
And hear geese bark as they go.

A fancier’s pigeons circle,
While a white flock of gull
Play the wind in a dark grey sky –
The contrast catching my eye;
As does the arc of a rainbow –
With sun and rain toe-to-toe.

Quiet thought turns to Constables,
As the wide-glass enables
Broad views of strong cumulus sky –
Changing shape as time goes by;
And – with moors, too, in the background –
It’s nice to briefly lounge round.

© David Franks/WalkaboutsVerse 2003.

Suffolk, England

Sam. (This is for all parents) …

Up there in the summer sky,

I showed my mum a big, white man.

He was really there, but I wonder why

she smiled and called him Sam Fairy Anne?

© David Crawford 2002.

They enter on their own time
shifting eternally until called down to earth as rain…

Halifax, UK (‘Home of good old Yorkshire clouds’).

A short poem about clouds

I wandered lonely as a man
Through barren streets and towns
When all at once I saw a cloud
A smile to raise my frowns.
The furrowed brow, the sullen eyes
Sparkled and came alive
When all at once that cloud appeared
Blessed by the divine.

© Darren Harper (Member 5462)

Clouds

Slippery bits of precipitation, curling and clamoring across
different levels of the atmosphere, they are
temporary fossils casting sedimentary shadows over
ocean, tilled earth and urban sprawl.

In the early evening and earlier morning, they become
chameleons confused against the darkened blue – instead
of hanging like oxygen rich bruises, black and swollen,
they oscillate from plum to blush to saffron.

Like a woman, their offerings shift, only a guess may
predict: cool fingertips of shade in heat,
tiny hard palms of water slapping the earth
or a million tiny Icaruses, ebbing ponderously down.

© Danielle Wick 2011

Clouds

Now I feel

And love

The subtle

Seductive light

Of your gifts.

Clouds,

Simply clouds

In changing shapes

A windswept, living painting

Of air and water

And light

Thank you

Who’s to say

If anyone on this God-forsaken freeway

Got it while driving?

Surely they must have said,

At least,

“What a day,”

While changing lanes at high speed.

But I saw and followed your gifts.

© Daniel Roest. 2007