The heartbreaking persistence of nature

Perfect sultry day, air thick as honey. A day for lying on the grass folded in the arms of a lover. For stroking damp hair from a sweated forehead. For cool crisp white wine and soft summer fruits dipped in sugar. For watching leavening clouds growing dense as charcoal. For laughing as slow swollen rain drops explode on the skin and running for cover under newspaper umbrellas. For ice creams, choc ices, kiss-me-quick hats and long cotton skirts. For barefooted footsteps, flip flops and wriggling scarlet varnished toes in the sand.

A crow stands on a chimney pot, king of all he surveys. Ragged jet wings and glistening beak full of discarded sandwich crusts. He feeds his young as tenderly as the gentlest cow nuzzles her calf, then arches his wings and leaps into the air in an act of faith as old as time. To us earth-stuck creatures, who can gaze only with envious eyes as he soars and swoops with a natural grace, his flight is a miracle.

In the high street, engines grind and rumble as cars and lorries inch their way towards the end of the work week. Office workers run lunch time errands, hair slick with sweat and make-up melting on burning cheeks. Music seeps through open windows, snatches of conversation, of badly tuned radios and exotic languages. Pigeons squabble over market remains on the edge of the pavement. Fresh black graffiti on the face of a white painted building, mismatched curtains hang limp at its dusty windows. A man chews his nails as his van waits to turn at the lights, his mind fixed on the long cold beer and the quick hot kiss to welcome him home.

Sunset on the beach and the hazy mist of night time heat blurs an invisible line between sea and sky. Herring gulls strut and peck on the shingle bank picking out oysters and winkling crabs. It is quite quite still; even the incoming ocean raises barely a ripple in the storm heavy air. Swifts chase overhead darting on the trails of hazy insects and the bulging vapours of mesmeric midges. Oystercatchers call to each other from the hem of the tide among the driftwood and the bladder wrack. The pink orange sun erupts through a rift in the clouds, its colour staining the sky as it starts its final descent. A giant blazing disc dropped with infinite slowness into a timeless slot machine by unseen hands.

We make our way back through the gathering twilight. The dogs have spent their effervescence and trot contentedly side by side, chewing sticks and stopping to sniff at the promenade news. The gulls are still fishing out of sight in the darkness, still calling to one another, still prising open shells. Groups of boys show off tricks on skateboards and bicycles, the nearby girls pretend not to notice as they talk and giggle just a little too loudly over cans of flat Coke. We say goodbye to our beach walking companions, then home once more in the quiet still evening. A moth scuttles up the window pane and the dog snores his contentment from the cave of his bed. A night at the end of a perfect summer day.

Picture: Surf City Sally's Sea Shell Emporium by Richard Cardona http://www.richardcardona.com/blog.html