Cumulonimbus

I’m piled high,

ice mountains shifting within.

Outside there’s gentle light,

velum fraying into blue. 

–

But reach into my heart and I am fierce as 

a snow lioness

roaring above a churn of lead.

–

Laid like the first snows of winter,

drifting, flocculating, forming:

I evolve forever.

–

Nebulous on a hot afternoon

I forge a head of thunder

fed with a river of ice

scalding through sinking air.

–

I can eat an aircraft, tear it to pieces

with my updrafts, my downdrafts. My

wind shear.

–

I am more than a thousand bombs

Ready to rain down on you

all. 

But what happens to me after the

gutspill.

–

After I’ve downloaded, drenched out.

When I’ve filled the present but have no future.

When I have been 

phenomenal. 

© Laura Parker 2023