Poetry Friday: The Word is CLOUD

Thanks to Irrelephant for sort of accidentally (?) offering up the Poetry Friday Word for today!

When I was a girl, I used to lie on the grass in the backyard and find shapes in the clouds. I was somehow convinced that each cloud was the spirit of something now-dead…a rabbit, a person, a car…whatever form it took in the sky. Even as a grownup, with knowledge of cloud formations and high/low pressure systems, I still harbour that fantasy…nothing dies…it just changes form.

Feel free to use the word CLOUD in your blog post today, in whatever form floats by your mind’s window…poem, story, photo, audio post of you on the phone with the cable company, statue of that naked guy in the park near your house, witty overheard-ism….

I wanted to do something a little different. I had used the phrase, “Let’s make a list of the clouds” in my blog post here. Well now…how can I use that phrase in a different way? How, linguistically, can that be presented? I tried a few…would have tried more had I had more time…and they are presented below.

Have a good weekend, y'all!


The Reading Chair

Bring your book here, my sweet girl,
And take this space in my arm.
What can we learn today?
Cirrus
Nimbus
Stratus
Cumulus
That one looks like a duck,
And that one a horse’s tail.
What?
Yes, it does sort of look like
Grandma Mabel.
Let’s make a list of the clouds
In formation
Soldiering across the sky.
I’ll write the words
And you draw the pictures
In
Crayola
Sky
Blue


Ten A.M., Conference Room

Let’s begin the meeting.
As you’ll see in
the document I’m
handing out,
(trees budding pale green)
first quarter
customer orders
are running
close to projections.
(robin, chickadee melodies)
Profits, however,
are up slightly,
due to increased average sale.
Depreciation on printing equipment
(sun oh god bring the sun)
has helped the bottom line also.
I called this meeting
to discuss ways we can
cut costs, hope
(grass sweet soft)
fully without taking
away from
the benefits we see here.
Let’s make a list of the
(clouds, fat and free)
ways in which each department
can contribute
at least ten
thousand
(breeze styling my hair)
dollars
in cost
cutting
measures.
(save me save me save me)


River Walk

Of the ways that we love,
Let’s make a list.
Of the clouds overhead,
Let’s inhale their mist.
Of the blue in reflection,
Let’s stop and walk in.
Of the spark in our eyes,
Let’s dig up some sin.