Cloud Songs

As I left the cat rescue after two hours of scrubbing, placating, scratching and petting, there was that extra-special summer smell in the air. The one you forget until you live through a fall, and then a winter, and then a spring - and then you are surprised by it again and realize that you've been longing for it since February.

I drove west on 540 at 9:00p. The sky was a gradient ranging from deep midnight behind me in the east, through a twilight gray, and then green, and then a shadowed red that would have appeared black without the darkness to provide contrast. Blotting out this marvelous blood-at-midnight hue, and that green shade reminiscent of the densest, hottest jungle under darkest night, was the blankness of a thunderstorm. The very topmost soaring arcs, spreading their veils high into the stratosphere, were still lit by the palest echo of sunset.

In the quiet, crawling swiftly along the interstate, I imagined the restless, frigid, invisible winds molding the clouds, and was amazed at being alive.