Canticle of Clouds by Jennifer Atkinson

Megan

Mary

Stratus—stuff and nonsense;

                                           how things tear and frazzle;

A happenstance of riffle and spume; dust and diaspora; in short, the long view.

Cirrus—easy come;

                              how things tendril, spindle, and tuft;

The ice- and milt-stippled current; a sigh; the intervention of drift.

Contrail—a stitch in time;

                                       how things linger and fade;

Legato passage, the having been; seam in the collateral damask.

Cumulus—two heads are better;

                                               how things swell and rush

To judgment; the hurly-burly of Moe and Larry; magisterial pomp, pratfallen.

Nimbus—see no, speak no evil;

                                              how things brim and spill;

Part and whole; the unmarked field over a field; pure radiance put to use.