The clouds are gossamer and the moment never lasts If we take daddy’s ladder, he says, looking out the window at the way the sky is rent, gold light spilling through the torn clouds, then we could put it on the top of that tall, tall hill and reach the sun, it would be hot, but I what I really want is to catch a cloud.
I would sleep with it at night, it would be soft against my cheek, and in the morning I would take it for a walk.
His cheeks flushed still from sleep, his hair still tousled, soft. On the couch pulling on corduroys for school, he stretches fingertips to toes touching both sides, so tall, and while he’s grinning big and wide, the cat arches her back by the door, the pot fills with water, the morning sky grows clear.