EVENTIDE Comes Too Soon

"Dark days comes so fast early these days. We seem to practically have no afternoon. Around four-thirty the snow has a blue tinge, and the sky has a faint pale glow.

The woods are dark charcoal, and most of the birds finish their feeding and begin to settle into the thick fluffy white pines by the swamp. The chickadees that have been singing all afternoon utter a few last Dee-Dee-Dees and snap up a few last sunflower seeds.

By dusk-dark, around five or five-thirty, you would never know we had a bird on the place. And then immediately it is night, faster than a third-act curtain. The whole world of day is at once shut away, the pale delicate winter colors, the amber sunlight, the wing-filled air, these are vanished . . . you know, I don't mind winter at all. I find it a rather snug season." ~ Gladys Taber in her book STILLMEADOW SEASONS

"Twilight drops her curtain down, and pins it with a star."
~ Lucy Maud Montgomery~

[L ~ Chickadee © Chris Smith Art]
[R ~ The Shortening Winter's Day © Joseph Farquharson]