Scattered clouds dot the pastel evening sky.
The sun’s last rays paint a light glimmer on the rippling sea.
Behind me, I hear rumbling and see rain.
I choose to look at the sea.
The sky reassures me: “There is a way.”
Blue and green reverberate inside me.
I close my eyes and I think blue — sky blue and water blue.
I open my eyes and I remember green.
I will hold this gift of colors close to my heart until I see you again, Little Cayman.
In the morning, the sky melts into the ocean and the ocean vaporizes up to the sky.
The horizon has vanished.
A minimalist gray palette.
In the evening, a blade of pale blue brings back the boundary.
Sunlight floods the horizon.
A rich gray palette.
Suspended between the low, dark clouds and the rolling green hills.
Bright light behind a stand of trees hints at a brighter future.
I hope.
The sun rises behind the screen of coastal fog.
A gentler awakening.
A fallen redwood becomes the substrate for new growth: moss, fern, redwood sorrel, trees.
A young redwood growing on the root end of the trunk of a fallen one has stretched its root like an arm to reach the ground.
My awed silence pays homage to nature’s resilience.
Low clouds hush the ocean.
In the space between the two, the day’s coda blazes lavishly, like the last firework.
Slate gray silence follows.
Parting thought of the setting sun.
(Observed from a viewing area close to the Mauna Kea Visitor Information Station, Big Island of Hawai’i)
The setting sun grabs the eyes.
I look at the brightest object in the sky.
But it blinds me to the beauty that is next to it.
I move my head slightly to the left and the sun exits my field of view.
I see the dramatic clouds, the paling sky and the unruffled ocean.
