This is the first of two poems by Patricia Laurence, Member 11,781.  She wrote this following the poetry workshop that she attended as part of the Orkney Sky Gathering.

Two                                       Contrails

  in the                                 sky

     had                              formed

       an X                       was it

          a kiss                a cross

             X marks        the spot

               a choice    a sum

                     a  wrong

                      answer

               look           again

             it                      drifts

           and                      fades

         smudges                   into

       nothing-                        ness

    so after                              all

perhaps                                   a  kiss

Patricia Laurence, May 2024

Image credit: A contrail filled sky over Wimborne in Dorset, England by Lindsay Gray

David Brown wrote to us saying “at the time of writing I was living on a hill in rural Northland, NZ. Very late one night I stepped outside and saw the strangest cloud formation I’ve ever seen: thin, perfectly regular lines of cloud stretching across the sky. They looked for all the world like the perfect lines drawn in sand by a Japanese wooden rake; you could see the stars between them and the undersides were lit up by the moon. It struck me like bars of a window. I went inside and wrote this simple haiku:”

Moonlight rakes the clouds
Etching fine silver lines that
Starlight fears to cross

© David Brown

Image Credit: A view above the cloud streets, Union, Indiana, US. © Beth Fluto

Anette Prehn, Member 63,419, appreciates the sky from her home in Denmark.  This poem was translated for her by Heidi Flegal, who suggested she send it to us.  It was used as lyrics, set to music by Rasmus Skov Borring in 2019.  Image:  Altocumulus with virga over Denmark © Soren Hauge

Like Shifting Clouds on High

A cloudscape ever-changing,
an endless voyage in the sky:
travellers re-arranging
their shapes as they go by.
In splendid, silent swirls they show
that wonders come and wonders go.
They offer up a lesson,
this whimsical procession
of shifting clouds on high.

As children we lay gazing
at fairy tales in shades of white.
In dappled sunlight lazing
we felt profound delight.
To see it through a childʼs bright eyes
– this big parade of small goodbyes –
recalls whatʼs lost, yet seeing
brings back the joy of being
with shifting clouds on high.

The boundless white collective
that travels on the windy tide
gives us a new perspective,
and mirrors whatʼs inside.
From Natureʼs wisdom take your cue.
She says: “Find that courageous you!
Your heart from joy and sorrow
can shape a new tomorrow
like shifting clouds on high.”

By Anette Prehn, Member 63,419 (© 2019)

Yvonne Gray sent us this ‘group poem’ written during a very enjoyable and productive creative writing workshop that was held at the Cloud Appreciation Society Orkney Sky Gathering  last week.  Image: A sunset over the Isle of Shapinsay, Orkney Islands © Peter Amsden

Clouds

clouds to make stories from
clouds to make dreams of
cloud – a shawl round the hills of Hoy
cloud – a warning. Something just over the horizon

cloud – a backdrop for the sunset
cloud forever changing
clouds that swiftly pass – or linger
cloud – a harbinger

cloud that carries precious rain
clouds soft as pillows

we feel cloud when we’re enveloped in cloud
but see nothing
when we see clouds, we can’t be in them
although we wish to

cloud for the fiery sunset
cloud for the artist’s vision
cloud for music’s inspiration
cloud for the poet’s revelation

by Mark Donovan, Yvonne Gray, Patricia Laurence, Mike Nordin, Carien van Zwol

Stromness, Wednesday 8 May 2024

Moira Lazarus is a song-writer and poet from London.  This is a poem she wrote a few years ago, just watching the London sky darkening.  Image: A sunset over Shepherds Bush, London, UK. (Red sky at night, Shepherd’s delight). © David Stening

From My Bedroom

I lie on my back and watch clouds travel
slow and thick
inked by the falling dusk, folds of velvet
blanking out the light.

This, then, is night.
A tipping over into another world,
an encroaching spell.

The sky holds pewter clouds now and is the colour of moonstone.
Second by second they are darkening faster,
blackening the roofs, hovering over chimneys like old smoke,
the sun almost gone.

Inside, closed curtains and artificial light prepare to
ward off the visceral intensity of night.

But I would like to fly
straight into this sky
ride the clouds to wherever they blow.
I would like to let the wild night flow.

Dawn will be here soon enough.

© Moira Lazarus, October 2016

Melody Serra, Member 56,638 from New York City, recently sent a poem she wrote about her membership and receiving our Cloud-a-Day emails.  Image:  A Circumhorizon Arc over Colorado, US.   © Keelin

Subject: Cloud-a-Day

 On August 29, 2021 I became a cloudspotter
                            member 56,638 of the Cloud Appreciation Society!
everyday since then, an email with a photo 
             taken by another member, of the sky, lover of blue
  to think that we are all part of the same sun-filled dome 
            to think that with our creative minds we can build shapes out of 
condensed water vapor 
            it all gives me chills	( the good kind )
  close to 600 emails have 
             brought me closer to
                                    skyscapes, landscapes, and seascapes around the world
                                                have taught me the difference between cirrus, cumulus, stratus, 
                                   cumulonimbus
                                   fluctus, asperitas, noctilucent, lenticular
                                              have taught me that the beams of light that shine through the gaps 
                                   in clouds, 
                                   like ladders of light reaching down to us, are called 
                                              crepuscular rays
                                   maybe i too will see the green flash one day
	                                      or the fluffy cumulus clouds reflecting on salt flats in Humahuaca
                                   or the optical effect, stunning color play, pearlescent
                                               called circumhorizon arc
		                                           for now i count myself so lucky, 
                                                                                  each sky greets me and beckons me
                                                                                                                       “what cloud do you see?”

© Melody Serra

Paul Davies, Member 28,330. wrote this descriptive piece to share with us.  We’ve paired it with an image of Zunderdorp, Gemeente Amsterdam, North Holland, Netherlands   © mercy

Staring out the window,
wondering why those cotton-wool balls
which look like mammoths
or a score of shrubs shoulder-to-shoulder
don’t over-fly my garden in smaller clumps
the size of cows or sheep or rabbits or birds

I mean
why are these clouds so large
is there some gravitational attraction
which keeps those visible water particles
together in bundles of roughly similar size

© Paul Davies

Chris Tetley, Member 10,338, sent us this poem composed to encourage us to wonder what our lives would be like without clouds.  The image was one he took locally of the sky over Devon, UK.

The Gladness of Clouds

The sky would be an empty stage without its cast of varied cloud,
Lacking daily interest with no shapes its sphere to crowd.
Though sunny bright and pleasant, days would lose what cloudscapes bring,
And all those kindnesses and insults that our way they’re apt to fling.

And what would we then talk about to strike up conversation,
Those introductory lines expressing joy or indignation?
What future, outdoor outfitters that count on rain and snow,
The meteorological media whose raison d’être cloud is to know?

And what of temperate gardens that enjoy cloud cover’s hues,
All who so much benefit from its shifting greys and blues?
And those who like the chance to snuggle up safely with a book,
When a storm is raging beyond brave walls and cosy sheltered nook.

And where would be our literature, much music and the arts,
Without the different cloud types and the influence each imparts.
Gone would be the rivers and lakes on which we so rely,
Not fed from heaving boulder-burdened blister-bursting sky?

Then what of useful reference; what becomes of cloud computing,
And that foggy place to have your head where absent thought finds its rerouting?
No ninth to share its happiness, or edged with silver lining,
Misty metaphor forever lost and in need of redefining.

Heavenward contemplation would be little but blue-sky thinking,
Much lost as a source of inspiration, if sky from sea no longer drinking.
And leaden would lose its meaning as dread divide of sky and land,
Weather from being moods arbiter, then little help and rather bland.

No more those clouds chameleon-like that mark days start and end,
As from and towards night’s sunless vault they with glamour arrive and wend.
Unnoticed as if not present for every hour then in between,
Horizon’s margin brief inflamed, in distant solitude serene.

Then what of this society that so appreciates their wonder,
From timorous playful newborn cubs to roaring lions of fearsome thunder?
Where every form and unique shape that commands its keen attention,
Acquires an immortal presence, and to the wide world gets a mention.

A sky without vast mounds of vapour, wind-jostled or scenic set,
Would be a lesser world for all where hope and rainbow never met.
And I could no more live without this flock that cossets Gaia,
Than I could its welcome shade; its forms, and fancy to inspire.

© Chris Tetley

Jan Boles, Member 13,316, sent us his humorous cloud related limerick.  We have paired it with an image of a curtain of precipitation falling from a storm system over Charlo, Montana, US by Ruth Quist.

A cloud spotter, known as Horatio,
Was keen on words rhyming with “ratio.”
He often would sigh,
Looking up at the sky,
“That’s not ‘rain,’ it’s ‘praecipitatio.’”

© Jan Boles February 2024