How to Paint Clouds

They take Wednesdays off. Siblings appearing
out of nowhere to take your house from you.

They’ve roadblocked the traffic circle, the railroad
crossing. The geese with a very small alphabet.

Threads plucked, scabs, a scar on my forehead.
An envelope breathing air into sound.

Floating is remaining alive, & when we travel
we are always leaving home. Evaporation

is an invisible rain falling upwards. A rope
we toss to the dock that we forgot to bring.

Author of the article

Daniel Coudriet’s first collection of poetry, Say Sand, was published in 2010 by Carnegie Mellon University Press, and his chapbook, Parade, appeared in 2012 from Blue Hour Press. His translation of Argentinean poet Alicia Genovese's Bridges was published by Cardboard House Press in 2024, and he was previously awarded an NEA Fellowship for Literary Translation. His poems and translations have made recent appearances in Bennington Review, Conduit, Denver Quarterly, jubilat, Moon City Review, Oversound, Prelude, the tiny, and elsewhere.