A violet vision in a dying day

As I go on my walk I see many flowering bushes, pink roses, spotted tiger lilies, delicately pretty pohutukawas, but today I see a vision that takes my breath away. A bush full of violet flowers, large velvet-petaled and stamens that bend into forks at right angles. The flowers hover like a violet cloud over the bush and even the ground underneath is made beautiful by the fallen violet petals among the autumn leaves.

The autumnal leaves look lovely everywhere, yellow-orange and crinkled, sprinkling the green grass in a violent contrast, on footpaths and huddling on the edges of gutters where the water gleams pink from the clouds above. I walk to the river where the heavy rain has transformed it into a rushing current. The blue waters speckled pink rush merrily along, rippled and foaming, carrying logs and leaves. But for the sound of the river everything else is still as the day dies.

The sun has set in the distant sea but its rays still linger in the sky in a reluctant farewell. The pink in the sky turns deeper into peach and then into a vivid rose as the interspersed clouds turn a deep shade of grey. The trees silhouetted on the horizon turn a dark shade of green. I wonder if we can be like a sunlit day, spread light and warmth while alive and be so gloriously alive in our dying moments that even they sparkle with joy and beauty.

As I walk alongside the stream the song of the flow mingles with the muted music of the birds in the trees. Dusk approaches rapidly and lights come on on the hills among the tiled roofs and the treetops. This is my favourite part of the day. It is as if the day is parting but with the promise that it will be back soon. Somehow there is always hope in the departing light.

As I near the house, night has fallen and the trees appear mysterious among the shadows. If the clouds clear away, soon the stars will be out and hopefully a laughing crescent moon. Everything is so perfect in nature, so effortless, so simple and so beautiful. If only we could learn to live like that.