With no apparent ferocity in their wildness,
shapes of white ash and beam
roll above and past the old house and barn,
which sag under them in rumpled pleats.
Bent peaks and gables finger the buoyant clouds
but seem too weak to hook, release
and catch them: armloads of damp laundry,
which through summer centuries stay daily fresh.
When I was a girl in a small town, one
summer night I dreamt that the moon came
close enough to touch. Clouds hover today,
almost brushing my head,
until something shakes them out.
Heavily they fall. For a while I stand.
