Salil Chaturvedi

Cloud-Fish

Clouds come over the hill in the evening. Many small clouds, shaped like puffer fish.

They glide eastward, stacking up over the plateau inland, gradually forming one large fish in the sky.

In the marsh, lapwings circle the sedges swaying in the breeze under the weight of their seeds. Whistling ducks begin to arrive in small flocks. 

A large shark-cloud covers the sun, sending thick dorsal fin-like rays into the evening sky. 

I wait. For nothing in particular.

The shark-cloud becomes a barracuda, then a dolphin and floats away.

Sunset tinges the sky with an orange glow. Streetlights come on as a last lone fish cloud disintegrates over the hill.

fading light
  a gentle tug
on the line

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About the Author

Salil Chaturvedi’s short fiction and poetry have been widely anthologized. His collections In the Sanctuary of a Poem (2017) and Love and Longing in the Anthropocene: Poems and Haibun (2021) are available on Amazon. He lives on the island of Chorao in Goa.