This was first published June 25, 2015.
When the long light comes and sows golden hues across my world, I stop. Marveling at the intense beauty that strikes me, I feel my chest tighten. It pushes until my spirit springs free, gliding in tilting waves like the resident vultures above me. Sounds soften. Tractors are shut down. Distant voices are gilded with laughter as the workday ends. The low meh from momma cows is answered in higher pitched bawls from their calves as they reunite for the oncoming darkness. Barn swallows swoop for their evening meal, rushing through the cloud ridden sky like mountain creek water over rapids. The first puff brushes my face as the nightime downslope breeze begins, cooler air sliding down the Big Horn Mountains with glee. Mosquitoes buzz and land and I shudder them off as I stand there, still entranced. Fresh hay scent lingers, clean, new, the scent of winter security from Mother Nature’s unpredictable wrath. Psht-psht-psht-psht-psht sings the sprinklers, rotating water and new life back into the scalped hayfields.
This is my favorite time of the day.
Hard work is over. Warm supper waits on the stove and cold beer condenses water droplets on the can. A hen struts by, headed for the coop.
The clouds have changed already in the long light, a slide show of artistry that I will never be able to capture. Except in my heart.
I can see it, smell it, feel it…!
Beautiful writing…captures your feelings so well Carol.
So wonderfully expressed.