Have you ever noticed large columnar clouds in the sky? They are cumulous clouds that form when warm air rises, then cools, then condenses. They are like a vertical story all of their own, shaped by the winds and the currents of warm air; nature depicting our very own Rorschach test.  I imagine countless people over the years have had their eyes drawn upward by nature’s art gallery, constantly changing and allowing the imagination to see figures that are unique to each set of eyes.

Clouds have inspired young and old, famous or infamous, rich and poor. They remind us there is a creator who carefully sculpted the earth. They can affect our mood positively when they are large, fluffy, and seemingly animated. They can look whimsical and dreamlike. They can inflict a touch of morose or fear when they linger, darkly or hauntingly in the sky, warning of danger to come.

Many literary writers have been inspired by clouds. Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote a poem called “The Cloud”, where he writes as if he is the cloud. He states, “I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, and out of the caverns of rain, like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again.”  I thought this was a brilliant description of clouds and their shape-shifting ability.  Emily Dickinson also wrote a poem called “The sky is low, the clouds are mean”, she describes the clouds as dark and sinister.  “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. A narrow wind complains all day, how someone treated him; nature like us, is sometime caught without her diadem.” There are several other poets that took inspiration from the fluffy white masses in the sky.

One doesn’t need to be a literary genius, however, to enjoy clouds. You simply need to look up in the sky and let your imagination go. Watch the birds catching a draft under the canopy of tiny water droplets that are trapped in what appears to be a billowy bundle of cotton.  Enjoy the awe of dark clouds gathering each other together to form the next parade of a thunderstorm.  You can simply lie on the grass with a friend or loved one and point out what you see, begging the other to see it too. Go ahead, gaze up into our magnificent sky and let your mind wander. The clouds are a gift from our creator and much more exciting than another 20 second video.