Muriel Nelson

Look at your clouds asleep on their backs.
The clouds I envy
blew from this scene
in a storm of shades, of sun-splattered wax,
to reconvene in each windy
guise I knew of you, in every
nebulous form.
I'm jealous. They are with you, learning
your thunderbolts
still circling earth,
your arm's hurling, your sudden turning
south to north, magnetic, and those jolts
when your face streaks brilliant, close, almost touching,
almost . . .
              rushing
on. Tell your Hera she's wrong if she reasons
I've tried more than sing
your praises. My breasts
weren't fermatas for your swift hands.

You rained from your distance.
I storm inside.