ane Flanders' poem "Cloud Painter" was suggested by the paintings of John Constable. Before the painting begins, the canvas is like the sky, just 'incidental'. It is just a backdrop for the tall trees, or a buckling wall.
Then, gradually, the painter's interest in painting the endless 'pleasures of landscape' makes the sky 'significant'. What is seen on the earth around us stretched upto the distant horizon may be enough, but still the clouds drifting in the sky make all the difference:
Cloud forms are technically correct--mares' tails
sheep-in-the-meadow, thunderheads.
You can almost tell which scenes have been interrupted
by summer showers.
It is the cloud painter's passion to see his future in the sky that makes the sky a mirror reflecting the beautiful objects on the grounds below. The sky becomes a repository of his imagination, a remote version of his reality.