The giant cottonwood catches and holds sunlight even as the rest of the world believes the sun has set. Its very bark glows like carnelian fire in the last rays of the setting sun.

In the late summer garden their lingers a confederation of loveliness whose only competition can be bound in the flaming colors of a sunset.

The early fall leaves have only just began to drift down in slow motion but they are never the less, precursors of what is yet to come.

As the light slowly fades from the sky the periwinkle shades of twilight come stealthily to claim the world and wrap it in a soft blanket of stillness.

Butterflies fold their wings and fall asleep cradled in the petals of a rose. Bees make themselves comfortable on the cushions of the bee balm. Robin sings his final vesper song before he too falls beneath the spell of the night. Only the crickets fiddle the night away.

In the dark blue crystal firmament the first stars emerge one be one until suddenly the whole sky sparkles with the brilliance of a field of diamonds.

The evening wind fills the air with the distilled fragrances of star gazers lilies and late roses.

Even as the twilight deepens into the dark vestige of night itself I linger here in this old swing allowing myself surrender to the mystery of night itself which has created a world unto itself wholly alien to the world of day but no less beautiful and a whole lot more mysterious.

Often I find myself going for long walks through the dark hours of the night driven by its mystery into its embrace. I find myself as at home in the company of the night as I do in the more familiar company of the day.