I'm not a poet, not even a writer of any kind, I seriously lack the formal education needed for that kind of thing.
Having said that, on my first visit to the English Lake District that involved walking the high ridges, I was so impressed, so completely taken with the quiet beauty of the mountains, lakes, valleys and villages, that I sat one evening and wrote this.
Well, actually I didn't just write it in an evening but I drafted it and then re-wrote it time and again over about three weeks before I'd got rid of all the bad spelling - no idea about the grammar though even now.
Silver Cloud
The silver cloud of morning moving quietly from the east
lays itself so gently, over fell and fern and beast.
Early, oh so early, when the dawn is still just forming,
the land laid out for all to see, with silver mist adorning.
Drifting soft across the surface of the beck and lake and tarn,
it moves along the valley, over village, over farm.
Harrison and Stickle at the valley head stand proud,
granite faces stark, unmoving, peaks brushed soft with cloud.
Loughrigg ferns and Lingmore trees, the bracken on Dow Bank,
all now gently moving with the wind along their flank.
Dark clouds soon will gather in the valley from the west
and rain will bathe it all; fell and crag and crest.
When night at last enfolds the land,
and sheep beneath their awning stand,
all will await - both land and Man –
the Silver Cloud of Morning.
Peter Clark. 1986
Glossary:
The Lake District in Cumbria, in late autumn …..
Harrison & Stickle are two peaks at the head of the Langdale Valley, Harrison standing at 2,400 ft. and Pike-O-Stickle, to give it's full name, is about 2,000ft.
Lingmore is a fell on the south side of the Langdale valley; famous for its unique small tree-like ferns.
Loughrigg is a small fell between Ambleside and Grassmere, heavy with fern and bracken.
A Tarn is a small natural lake formed by a depression left behind when the glaciers retreated.
Beck is the Norse word for stream.