Light thickens

Even framed by electric poles and oak trees, the urban sunset is a glory from my perch on the front stoop. The underbelly of the bank of torn cotton clouds is gilded - first bright apricot, then lemon, then fiery magenta.

There's a soundtrack - doves chittering across the sky like rockets to their roost, the jingle of a cat's collar bell, a squirrel rustling busily in the water oak, snapping twigs and scampering to stash them in the nest it's building.

The clouds again - matte gray above, soft, glowing mauve below. A closer focus - the first sweetpeas of the season an unabashed spray of labial pink on the white fence, red mustard in the garden a glossy aubergine glinting with water drops from the sprinkler.

A catbird is mewing in the camellia bushes and a chickadee scolds the squirrel - they are nesting, too, in the water oak. A dog barks to be let in to dinner and, maybe, the chance to chase dream rabbits on the sofa, with soft woofs and twitching paws.

As the shadows lengthen, the basil puts out one last blast of scent, with a delicate undertone of dill. Sweat from the day's toil in the garden dries on my skin. I need a shower. But there is still a last gasp of sunset and there is good red wine in my glass. My book lies forgotten at my side as I read the twilight ode in the sky.

"Light thickens," Shakespeare wrote in the Scottish play. He meant it as an augur of dire deeds to come. "Good things of the day begin to droop and drowse; while night's black agents to their preys do rouse."

"Light thickens" - such a perfect way to describe the mutable light of sunset and dusk, so ephemeral and yet so sensual you can feel it like the brush of fairy fingers on your face. There was no ill omen in tonight's sky, and night's black agents are nowhere near, and not even a police car siren two streets over can break the gloaming's spell.

There is dirt under my fingernails and new plantings in the garden. Tomorrow, I will plant more. But just now, I will let the dusk settle around me like a gossamer mantle and toast the evening and the rising full moon with the last drop of wine.