Beautiful Clouds .... a gift

After nearly three years of severe drought here in my state, I must pay homage to the rain and beautiful clouds. Often the weather turns from a relatively mild winter to summer. Lately we are enjoying plenty of rain, cool nights in the forties and mild days in the high sixties. We have been really blessed with a true spring.
Last year, I was privileged to have in my speech class, a very talented, gracious, and beautiful Ukrainian exchange student. She truly added much to the community of the school. Among the gifts she shared with me are a few of her collections of photographs from her travels here and from her homeland. She was and remains a serious art student. Now back in her own country, she will graduate from her high school this spring. Featured here is one of her photographs made somehwere in Virginia, April 2008.

I am the daughter of the earth and water.

And the nursling of the sky;

I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores,

I change , but I cannot die.

from "The Cloud"

Percy Bysshe Shelley