Not a man, but a cloud in trousers

It has been in the year 1913, when I came back from Saratov to Moscow and - to proof my harmlessness to my companion- said that I was "not a man, but a cloud in trousers". No sooner had I said it, I understood that this phrase was great for a poem. But what, if it would spread now into public by word of mouth and would be wasted and pointless? Taken by a terrible restlessness I interrogated the girl for about half an hour, with the help of suggestive questions and I calmed down only when I had convinced myself, that my words had been gone already through the other of her ears. Two years later, I used "cloud in trousers" as a title for an entire new poem.

Vladimir Mayakovsky in " How to Make Poetry"

"Cloud in Trousers" here

From Art Club Caucasus works by various artists