Lee Passarella

Instinct

They’re known as nimbostratus,
these clouds that look as if drawn
with a straightedge: gray ledge
of rock. A dirty waterfall of rain

sheers from them. All around,
the sweaty air moils; tree leaves
swim, seething and sinuating
through rapids, exposing the quick

silver of their ribs, their undersides.
Equivocal birds zigzag down
current, fumbling in a whorl
of leaf tatters, feeling their way

toward the never-before-
seen shoals called home.