Poems about clouds capture their ethereal beauty, ever-changing nature, and symbolic significance. This poetry often weaves them into metaphors for the vastness of the universe, the mysteries of existence, and the transient essence of life itself.
Clouds are often used in proverbs, conveying nuanced meanings. Proverbs employ them as metaphors for dreaminess, euphoria, or lofty aspirations, underscoring their imaginative power. They usually resemble various shapes or objects, sparking our imagination and encouraging us to see things beyond their physical form. The poetry frequently presents clouds facilitating an environment ripe for daydreaming and contemplation.
These poems explore the sublime aura and mystique created by the clouds as they shroud the horizon, sun, moon, and stars in mystery, obscuring what is beyond them and lending an air of intrigue about what may be hidden from view, infusing the atmosphere with an otherworldly allure.
In poetry, clouds are a natural phenomenon that links to the broader tapestry of the natural world, grounding us in its rhythms. Through verse, we glimpse their integral role in the environment, complementing the timeless cyclic processes of nature.
Clouds are responsible for weather patterns like rain, storms, or sunshine. Some poems explore the emotions and moods associated with weather. Depending on the weather, nature mirrors a spectrum of human emotions, from excitement, happiness, and calmness to restlessness, rage, and tumult.
In these poems, we witness the interplay between nature’s elements and our emotional landscapes as the atmosphere stirs, compliments, or evokes certain emotions. Clouds remind us of our interconnectedness with nature and the profound resonance it holds within the depths of our being.
One of Shelley’s famous poems, ‘The Cloud,’ presents the cycle of nature and its continuous processes through a personified cloud.
I wield the flail of the lashing hail,
And whiten the green plains under,
And then again I dissolve it in rain,
And laugh as I pass in thunder.
‘Love Letter (Clouds)’ by Sarah Manguso explores the end of relationships and how it can often seem like you’ve wasted your time.
I didn’t fall in love. I fell through it: Came out the other side moments later, hands full of matter, waking up from the dream of a bullet tearing through the middle of my body. I no longer understand anything for longer than a long moment, or the time it takes to receive the shot. This kind of gravity is like falling through a cloud, forgetting it all, and then being told about it later. On the day you fell through a cloud . . .
Robinson Jeffers’s ‘Clouds at Evening’ speaks to the earth reflecting on the evening weather, dreams, and reality.
Enormous cloud-mountains that form over Point Lobos and into the sunset,
Figures of fire on the walls of to-night's storm,
Foam of gold in gorges of fire, and the great file of warrior angels:
Dreams gathering in the curded brain of the earth,
‘Mad Song’ by William Blake shows the speaker’s frantic pain and turbulent mental state through changes in nature.
The wild winds weep,
And the night is a-cold;
Come hither, Sleep,
And my griefs infold:
Wordsworth’s ‘A Night-Piece’ describes a moment of the night sky’s beauty akin to heaven’s glory that is etched in the speaker’s mind.
———The sky is overcast
With a continuous cloud of texture close,
Heavy and wan, all whitened by the Moon,
Which through that veil is indistinctly seen
‘The Sky is low — the Clouds Are mean’ by Emily Dickinson depicts nature’s moods through personification and the ups and downs of a storm.
The Sky is low — the Clouds are mean.
A Travelling Flake of Snow
Across a Barn or through a Rut
Debates if it will go —
‘And Soul’ by Eavan Boland is a poem about death and a body’s dissolution into the elements it is made up of.
My mother died one summer—
the wettest in the records of the state.
Crops rotted in the west.
Checked tablecloths dissolved in back gardens.
H.W. Longfellow’s ‘Moonlight’ discusses the simple idea that people create their own meanings in life and that every experience is unique.
As a pale phantom with a lamp
Ascends some ruin's haunted stair,
So glides the moon along the damp
Mysterious chambers of the air.
Emily Dickinson’s ‘It sifts from Leaden Sieves’ explores how snow transforms the landscape, showing its impact on our surroundings.
It sifts from Leaden Sieves -
It powders all the Wood.
It fills with Alabaster Wool
The Wrinkles of the Road -
‘Moods’ by Sara Teasdale unveils nature’s embrace in weariness and dreams, as rain and birds echo universal aspirations.
I am the still rain falling,
Too tired for singing mirth —
Oh, be the green fields calling,
Oh, be for me the earth!
Coleridge’s ‘Christabel’ is an uncompleted long narrative that tells the story of Christabel and Geraldine, featuring supernatural elements.
'Tis the middle of night by the castle clock,
And the owls have awakened the crowing cock;
Tu—whit! Tu—whoo!
And hark, again! the crowing cock,
‘Ode on Melancholy,’ while not amongst the most lauded of the Odes, is perhaps the most uplifting and hopeful of all of Keat’s Odes. Keats addresses the reader, a sufferer of Melancholy, and tells him not to worry.
No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist
Wolf's-bane, tight-rooted, for its poisonous wine;
Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kiss'd
By nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine;
Derek Mahon’s ‘Everything is Going to be All Right’ is a short, reassuring poem that reminds readers to find calm and hope even in the middle of dark and difficult times.
The sun rises in spite of everything
and the far cities are beautiful and bright.
I lie here in a riot of sunlight
watching the day break and the clouds flying.
‘A Boy’s Dream’ is a poem that looks at the dreams of a child while wishing to escape from the realities of the waking world, focusing instead on the fantastical images.
I cling to soft clouds swaying
In the wind as a swing
Clouds in soft colors reflecting
‘A drop fell on the apple tree’ by Emily Dickinson is filled with joy. It describes, with Dickinson’s classic skill, images of the summer season and how a storm can influence it.
A drop fell on the apple tree
Another on the roof;
A half a dozen kissed the eaves,
And made the gables laugh.
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