Listening to Clouds

Be comforted, dear soul! There is always light behind the clouds.”

Louisa May Alcott

When I began to listen to poetry, it’s when I began to listen to the stones, and I began to listen to what the clouds had to say, and I began to listen to others. And I think, most importantly for all of us, then you begin to learn to listen to the soul, the soul of yourself in here, which is also the soul of everyone else.”

Joy Harjo

Sometimes when I am writing, my head is in the clouds. And, I have been writing. Now, I may shift from words to images. These cloud images I took with my simple phone camera, but, I must also paint to really listen, to hear my soul. Below is detail from larger painting titled “Rushgatherers,” inspired by photos of Penn Center, St. Helena, SC (Face of an Island)

(Jacquelyn Markham, poet/painter)

Jacquelyn Markham, poet & writer, author of Rainbow Warrior, Finishing Line Press (2023), Peering Into the Iris: An Ancestral Journey and China Baby, among other titles.