Morning. Sweat drips down my face and soaks my teeshirt from the short walk to the Curious Gourds garden. Again, heat blankets New England.
Two nights ago I awoke while it was still dark, enjoying the relative cool of early morning. Through the window I saw an orange-tinged crescent moon surrounded by a handful of stars. The sky was ever so slightly touched by color, faintly purple. I dozed and woke again to see morning light seeping into the darkness and listened to a lone bird greeting the morning. Stars still freckled the sky, but they were fainter, and the line of the Acteon Ridge glowed pink.
Dusk drains the landscape of light and color. Dawn reverses this emptying, refilling the sky, mountains, forest and meadows with blues, grays and greens that are chased by orange and pink: green seeps into the foreground; blue-gray soaks through the blue-black mountains in the background; and the meadows combine green with a sprinkle of reflected pink and orange.
I doze again this time when I wake my eyes smart from a burning circle of sun that is accompanied by a cacophony of birdsong.