Full Moon, Cirrocumulus, Light Breeze, and Iridescence

Ocean and crater,
an iris, wide pupil,
until a thread, a clump
of cloud startling
the way a car door
thumps closed, the face
turned to the wheel,
down the drive,
gone. And silence
as a canoe slides
past the dock and dusk,
the plash of the paddle,
ripple of water, tip
of the prow drifting
beyond a branch,
the planks under us
even now rocking.

High Sky

The sky has slipped its stitches,
the feathered cirrus, wool of cumulus,
gauze shreds of layered stratus
gone with the unexpected guests
who left this morning
after a night of pelted rain.
Now the sun flashes and shears
the few seams left
till bare skin bursts through
and we're down to ourselves,
two loose threads, the knot undone.

Copyright © 2003 Wendy Barker All rights reserved
from Chariton Review
Reprinted by Verse Daily® with permission