I love the way they creep in above lengthening shadows.
I love the way they slowly develop, from a tinge of bright sky to a speckled radiant flash; their gradual evolution from ordinary azure to enchanted glow.
I love their unpredictable splendour, their brief panoramic spectacle, their scarlets and golds and purples and pinks that bloom and burn, then dim and fade, never to reappear.
I love every random cloudbase reflection, each unique dusky spectacle, bewitching the landscape, enhancing the mundane, and heralding night's curtain of darkness.
I love sunsets. I just wish I saw more of them.
That isn't my photo of a sunset, it's Ian's. He took it yesterday evening from his flat in Docklands, from which there appears to be an excellent view both outward and upward. When atmospheric phenomena fill the sky, be they clouds or sunshine or rainbow or storm, these appear as part of Ian's everyday backdrop. And there have been some breathtaking sunsets over the summer, so Ian's been able to act fast and capture manyofthem.
I'm far less fortunate. My flat is shielded by its immediate surroundings. I can see only a tiny patch of northern sky, framed above a deep brick canyon. From where I live, the sun is only visible from one corner of one room at the height of summer. My dawn is forever obscured, while at nightfall no more than a hint of pink ever floats into view (during June and July only). Of nature's aerial spectacles, when I'm at home I see nothing.
If the sunset is magnificent, the first I ever know of it is via Twitter. When the skies above London were lit up by a dramatic electrical storm earlier this year, I missed the lot. Should a UFO ever descend upon the capital and hover menacingly in the air, from indoors I'd never even notice.
Next time I move house, I need to live somewhere with sky. Because I love sunsets. And I miss them.
