Wake up your poetry brains with 15 Words or Less (guidelines are here)!
I took this picture on an overseas flight a couple of years ago. There’s something about seeing clouds from overhead that makes me feel a lot safer while flying–totally irrational, but I can’t help it. It’s like they’re a safety net waiting to catch me.
This picture makes me think of:
- Camping with friends in hot weather, when we would just spread sleeping bags wall to wall and lie on top of them
- What if the sky were made of a vanilla malt? Or a marshmallow malt (had one of those a couple of years ago and it was amazing)?
- Clouds painted on the ceiling of a huge, beautiful room in a library I visited a couple of years ago (perhaps in Boston?)
And, here’s my first draft.
It’s your turn! Have fun and stick to 15 WORDS OR LESS! (Title doesn’t count toward word count:>) If you leave a poem in the comments, and if it’s 15 words or less, I’ll try to respond!
76 Responses
Occasionally
Air machines
See
Cloud blankets
And sky nymphs
Dancing in the atmosphere
Like stars
I Love the last 2 lines
I love how you used “air machines” instead of airplanes! Gives this whole poem a magical fairy/steampunk feel!
Love the image of dancing sky nymphs.
It’s always magical to see this when flying, and your ‘dancing sky nymphs’ are a wonderful image.
Amelia, I immediately thought of naming images one sees when staring at clouds from the ground. I will be looking for a nymph.
I always thought I should be able to walk on the clouds. Being able to dance on the atmosphere would be the best!
Laura,
I hope you and your books don’t get wet. I enjoyed this experience. I felt in the moment!
Thanks, LInda!
parachutes off moonbeams
marble-skies of
clouded-words
w
R
I
T
I
N
G
cheating all my
P
O
E
M
S
Poem By Jessica Bigi
I love that opening line, Jessica. It makes me think of a some little creature ina picture book exploring the night sky and then parachuting safely home:>) I also love the marble skies of clouded words. Beautiful!
Thank you what a wonderful image maybe I will build a story out of those lines 🙂
I love the ‘marble skies, too Jessica.
Jessica, I love how you connected parachutes with the plane.
Love those marble skies!
WINTER’S COMING
Fly up high and you will see
all the snow that waits to be.
Ooh…maybe that’s what geese are thinking as they fly south!
How fun to imagine the snow up there waiting.
Wonderful to imagine, & here in the Rockies that’s what ALL the ski resorts are hoping!
Cindy, weather forecasts would be so much more fun if reported in rhyme. Lovely!
I love this. Makes me feel wet and cold. Lovely imagery.
It would be pretty amazing if we could tell the snowfall amounts by looking at the winter’s store of clouds!
(Hurricane Patricia pushed her way through here, leaving a trail of mist.)
Stratus clouds
fill the world with mist.
I walk through…
mystified.
I like mist/mystified and the soft feel to your poem.
I’ve ‘walked’ through clouds high in the mountains, & you’ve made me remember, Margaret. Love the mist/mystified, too.
Clever Margaret.
Love the play on words with mist and mystified!
Lovely wordplay–and mood:>)
Oh Laura, I feel just the opposite of you. I like clear skies or scattered clouds when flying.
BOARDING: “A” GROUP
Paid extra money.
Twitched in line.
Got a window seat!
View’s just fine -
till take-off.
There is “that” moment when one is hopeful & trusting, too, at take-off. Love your surprise end.
I empathize with your feelings Ellie, but I also feel some comfort in the bank of clouds that seem to be “lifting” the plane.
Heehee–I hate the window seat, as I generally spend the flight trying to convince myself that I’m not 30,000 feet in the air:>) I love your verb “twitched” here.
With Thanksgiving fast approaching, I’ve changed the plane window to the window in my oven.
Holiday Calories Don’t Count
Mounds of melting marshmallows
shield yummy yams
full of fall flavors
awaiting turkey day.
Great take! I can almost smell the day!
Thank you Donna. Turkey day one of my favorites. Now, after reading yours, I’m ready to crawl back in bed! Love the title and the hint of Christmas.
None of my current family likes the marshmallows now, but I remember as a kid how much I loved them. Thanks for the memory!
Same with my family Linda, but if they are toasted a bit some can be tempted.
Nice connection to Thanksgiving, Martha.
Oh, Martha, if only your title were true. I just left my Weight Watchers meeting, where my weigh-in was less than spectacular (but not surprising:>) Your poem made my mouth water.
This one just makes me think of so many things. They all converged in this.
Comfort and Joy
Down-filled sky
Winter’s nigh
Growing grayer
Another layer
Now to bed
Sleepyhead
Whispered prayer
Comforted
Donna JT Smith, all rights reserved
Love this! I like how your first line’s image and the last word tie is all together.
Love the play on words with ‘comforted’, Donna‑a beautiful thought.
Ooh, Donna, this is one of my favorites. It feels so wintry and cozy and beautiful. Lovely!
I had to really think to come up with something besides cotton balls.
That was my first thought, but then it also looked a little like snow.
Thanks for this site, Laura, as busy as you are. It does make us think.
Winter Fun
Play outside
in lumpy snow.
Come inside
for hot cocoa
with a melting
marshmallow.
Good one Pat. Looks like we’re both in a marshmallow world!
Thanks, Martha. I love that you thought of your “window in the oven.”
I like the rhyming, Pat. It’s challenging to do that in 15 words, & yours is wonderful.
Thanks, Linda. I enjoy trying to rhyme. I used to teach first grade and I remember how those little kids loved rhyming poetry.
You’re welcome, Pat–thank you for being part of our community! I love this, as those clouds work as both snow and marshmallows. Such a cozy poem:>)
Frightened flier
looks out,
sees quilt batting,
prays for
soft landing.
Ha! It does look like quilt batting!
That ‘soft landing’ is what helps us imagine the clouds holding us. Love it!
Very comforting Cynthia.
Yes–quilt batting. This picture makes me think of my mom, who used to quilt (still does, in very limited bits).
autumn trees plunge
obscuring clouds with color–
pond reflection
The idea of a pond reflection is clever, Buffy. I didn’t thinking of looking down to see ‘up’!
I love your use of “plunge.” Works in different ways, both with the pond and the idea of leaves falling, temperatures plunging, leaves dying. A lot of connotation around that one word!
I love your ending, Laura, takes it to a new idea! And I too feel good when we have that ‘cushion’ of clouds, seems right, doesn’t it?
Imaginary Winter
Snow fields wait
for angels’ play.
For them, it’s just
another day.
Linda Baie ©All Rights Reserved
Love the first two lines wonderful poem such a beautiful pic this paints 🙂
Great imagination! Angels playing on that field of snow.
Thanks Linda. Angels and clouds just go together.
Ooh, what a great idea, Linda! I’m totally picturing those snow angels in the clouds. Absolutely lovely.
Love the image of angels playing on the clouds of snow fields… I wonder if they are the snow angels we make down here that disappear???
Snowfield of clouds—
houses and hills disappear.
Will they come back?
—Kate Coombs
Yes. The whole world feels so distant, like a memory somehow, when I’m flying. It might be there…or it might now. And that’s even when it’s NOT obscured by clouds. Love the mood of this. Thanks!
Lovely Kate.
App, App and (G‑d Forbid!) Away
All my
files and photos
folded in clouds
All that
I am
Streaming in air
-Pamela Ross
Oh, this is fantastic. Cloud storage does really require a leap of faith, doesn’t it? When Google Docs were unavailable one day a couple of weeks ago, I thought of people who were relying on them for presentations and such, just left hanging.
I love that second stanza, especially. So ethereal and formless and un-back-upable:>)
AND I am telling you… (channeling the DREAM GIRLS soundtrack here):
Someday paper and pen will be in again.
Make that someday happen soon.
My Google Chrome crashed the other day. Why? No clue.
My computer screen was black this morning and would not go on.
I pulled cords, turned the CPU off and on, prayed, waited, and thank goodness my computer was working.
But I always fear THE DAY IT WON’T.
I will not be in the Google Clouds. I will be in Computer Hellllllllllllllll. 😉
Thank you for the kind words.
Stream on.
Stream on.
Ack! I have those weeks occasionally, and they ARE pure hell. Right now, my iPhone is slowly suffocating due to minimal storage space and apps that keep getting bigger, and my laptop is going on three years old, so you know it’s ancient. Always waiting for the axe to fall…
Am I here?
That’s quite the existential question…
If a comment falls in the forest, can anyone ever read it? 😉
I don’t understand why I am failing at posting at this stage of my brilliant career! Help me, Tech Titans! :(((
On the bright side, both these comments posted with no intervention from me:>)
Let me out
To walk on the clouds
Or swim in the sea
of marshmellows
Anne McKenna
Sea of marshmallows–love that. As comforting a a cup of hot cocoa!