(De Rerum Natura 6, 451-523)
Clouds take shape in the blue sky and gather
where flying bodies get tangled up together;
tiny clouds are borne along by breezes
till the moment when a stronger current rises.
Hills, for instance: the higher up the peak
the more industriously they seem to smoke;
wind blows these wisps on to the mountain tops
while they are still vague, evanescent strips
and there, heaped up in greater quantity,
they reveal themselves as a visible entity
trailing from snowy summits into the ether,
the empyrean spaces torn by wind and weather.
Steam rises from the sea, as becomes clear
when clothes on the shore absorb the salty air;
particles rise from rivers and wet slopes
while the sky, weighing upon them, packs them tight
and weaves them closely like a linen sheet.
Some come from space, as I’ve explained before,
their number infinite, their source obscure,
and these can travel at the speed of light.
No wonder the storm clouds, so fast and thick,
darkening fields and sea, slide up so quick
since from the blow-holes of the outer spheres,
as in our own windpipes, our glands and pores
the elements come and go, mysterious and opaque,
through ducts and channels, rooms and corridors
as if in a house of opening, closing doors.
As for the rain clouds, how they come to grow
and fall as rain on the drinking earth below -
a multitude of life-germs, water semen, floats
with cloud stuff and secretions of all sorts,
both swollen up, the fat clouds and whatever
solution is in the clouds themselves, cloud-water,
as our own bodies grow with the serum, gism,
sweat, whatever fluid is in the organism;
also they draw up brine with streaming sieves
when wind drives the clouds over the waves,
hoisting it from the surface in dripping fleeces
(same thing with bogs and other soggy places).
When all these water-sources come together
clouds discharge their excess moisture either
by ganging up in a bunch to crush each other
till tears flow; or else, blown thin by winds
and sun-struck, they give off drizzling rains
as wax held to a brazier melts and runs.
Sometimes the two things coincide, of course,
the violent pushing and the rushing wind-force,
and then you get a cloudburst which persists
with clouds upon clouds, tempests upon tempests
pouring out of the heavens, soaking the smoky air
while the earth breathes back in bubbles everywhere.

An ocean-drop, dash in the dark, flash in the brain,
suspension in the red mist, in the light-grain,
a twitching silence in the hiding place,
fine pearly night-glow of the forming face,
the pushing brow, the twirling cars and knees ...
Space-girl, soap on a rope, you like cloud-swing,
bath-water and world music; a kidney bean,
you lie there dreaming on your knotted string
listening hard with shut, determined eyes
a soul of barely determinate shape and size.

Are thoughts a tap trickle, a cloud formation?
Given to light readings and rich inactivity,
alternative galaxies, a-tonal composition
and tentative revisions of quantum gravity,
you drift in a universe of unspoken words
far from the bright lights and story-boards.
A shy girl in your own private microcosm,
you travel from cloud-chasm to cloud-chasm
awaiting the moment when the burbles start,
the camera action, the first signs of art;

and enter like one of Aristophanes’ cloud chorus
heard “singing in the distance” though not for us,
daughters of ocean for whom alone we write,
grave sisters of the rainbow, rose and iris
who dip their pitchers in the sea at night
and soak the risen leaf before first light
capricious dirigibles of the swirling ether,
great wringing sacks above the luminous earth
from whose precipitations image’s gather
as in the opacity of a developing-bath.

After a night of iron-dark, unmoving skies
you open your eyes; we too open our eyes
on a clear day where hedgerow and high-rise
swivel deliriously round your baby-bed
in the attic studio where you lie safe
as yin and yang in your own secret life.
Sunlight streams like April at the window;
sky-flocks graze above your dreaming head.
Life is a dream, of course, as we all know,
but one to be dreamt in earnest even so.

We’ve painted a cloud ceiling, a splash of stars
and a thin convective stream, not a bad job:
“Who can number the clouds in wisdom?” (Job).
The indeterminate firmament is all yours.
Rain glitters along a branch, the earth revolves;
soft toys stare, wide-eyed, from the bookshelves.
Will you be Echo, Gráinne, Rosalind? No,
you won’t be any of these; you will be you
as, “kitten-soft”, you float from the mother-ship,
thirst pockets open for the infinite trip.

I who, though soft-hearted, always admired
granite and blackthorn and the verse hard-wired,
tingle and flow like January thaw-water
in contemplation of this rosy daughter.
Be patient with an old bloke; remember later
one who, in his own strange, distracted youth
awoke to the cold stars for the harsh truth,
now tilts a bottle to your open mouth.
So drench the nappies; fluff, bubble and burp:
I probably won’t be here when you’ve grown up.