Dawn
The Sun rises from its slumber, blinks at it’s surroundings and slides back into a blanket of heavy clouds. The dread at the toils of the longest day or the urge to procrastinate the inevitable driving it back into comfort.
Besides the Sun, the clouds, the sea and everything inanimate in between, the only other fathomable presence is that of an angler. A silent, dark silhouette against the shore, standing on the concrete, motionless in the calm of the unearthly early hour.
The hour before the dawn is one for insomniacs and maniacs, the ones who seek to escape the excesses of late night debauchery or the blinding cheerfulness of the morning light. The early morning still, the absence of motion and the desolate hour work in favour of those who seek to escape interaction with their fellow beings.
A gentle breeze, faithful to the hour, blows through. The only aberration is a crow, announcing its presence and breaking the calm. The crow despite its defiant rebellion and the absence of a cause settles into the mood. The presence established, it goes quiet , the day will be long.
After the dawn has passed, shrouded behind cloudy veils, unnoticed except for the slivers escaping the shroud, the day starts to rise, brief movements from the distance, another angler joining the solitary straggler at the bank.
The cool early morning light reveals other faces, joggers, dog walkers heading into the day.
Dusk
Moments before the day withdraws, when the sunlight recedes in a slow forward facing shuffle, the crowds begin to swell. If the dawn is a retreat then the dusk is a rave.
Joggers, walkers, solo cyclists, families in cycling groups, uncertain lovers or the ones exhausted by the trials of the day, all crowd the paths. There is joy in exhaustion, a return to the familiar, hope in the fading light.
At the edge of the park, down a winding descending path, right next to the stones and fences that mark the end of the path is a brief patch of solitude. Recluses hang out in this spot, a closed end of the large park , where the only excitement is the lack of excitement.
The coy lovers focus on each other and ignore the rest, the anglers stand wordlessly and the odd person with neither a companion or a hobby reclines on the benches, content in the absence of a purpose.
The receding sunlight, hiding and revealing itself behind a profusion of clouds, washes its colours into stratus patterns. A patch of of yellow or orange closer to the sun, whites, blues and greys spread further away, an imperfect palette randomly diffused in the sky. The dull formation of the day turn into ethereal shapes by the evening, a grand show before the dark dissolves all that remains.
A coast guard boat sails by, the crew in orange reflecting the sunlight. The winds drowns the noise of the boat and boatmen, they seem incurious of the shoreline focusing on the rocky hurdles close to the shore. Their day is not yet done, content is far away.
When the day has stretched far, warming up during the course, the cool evening breeze set in caressing and slapping in turns, and driving the clouds over the sun, hastening the end of what has been the longest day of the year.
