Gloaming

A fine word 'gloaming'. It expresses the hue, light and atmosphere of dusk, twilight, sunset...whatever you wish to call it. Most people can quote "Roaming in the gloaming by the bonnie banks o' Clyde." So that's what gloaming is.

Camping holidays always meant sitting outside, having a cuppa, sitting quietly watching the sunset. Watching gloaming develop. For it does develop. Like watching a time lapse movie. The subtle change of colours and atmosphere. Not only a visual experience, but also an audible one. Birds return to roost, small mammals scurry for cover, bats flit among the fir trees, larger animals settle down for the night, flying insects emerge as it gets a bit cooler, moths flutter round the lights by  the tent and a calmness pervades the scene.

As I write I am recalling June evenings spent at a remote lochside in the mountains . A place called Lochindorb. However I am sure that as you read you too might recall a seaside, a lake, a stream or the like where you too experienced 'gloaming'.

This morning I woke early with an idea for a poem. Arose, found an old envelope and scribbled this down. Enjoy.

     Gloaming at Lochindorb

     Gloaming. That time of day when sky and mountains unite in purple hue.
     The whimbrel calls as it crosses the moor, making for it's nest on the hill.
     The loch grows mirror calm only rippled by rising trout.
     Clouds of midges, seeking mates,  rise from the heather.
     The female irritatingly bites and annoys sheep sleeping by the shore.
     An owl hoots in the distance.
     A lamb calls.
     Two woodcock flit over  the myrtle.
     Noisy oystercatchers come home late.
     Yet there is a silence, a calm, a closing of day.
     Gloaming, sunset, twilight, dusk...
     That golden, purple, pink light
     'Twixt day and night.

      Thanks for reading, Kath