Sunsets of the Week

Oh, gaze ye on the firmament! a hundred clouds in motion,
Up-piled in the immense sublime beneath the winds' commotion,
Their unimagined shapes accord:
Under their waves at intervals flame a pale levin through,
As if some giant of the air amid the vapors drew
A sudden elemental sword.

{extract from A Sunset by Victor Hugo}

January 1st 2012

My small cottage faces due west, and as I am close to the very edge of the great Atlantic Ocean I am often treated to the most spectacular skies in the evening.  Now, don't get me wrong, a 'spectacular sky' does not have to be the one that is a vibrant cacophony of orange and purple and pink; on the contrary, it can be the delicate blending of a hundred subtle shades of milky opal blue shot with a soupcon of pink and green as the westering day slips slowly away.  It can be whisps of softest fleece drawn across the sky towards the spinning wheel of Heaven; it can be marshmallow puffs or giant, billowing sails; scudding past or slowly edging by; the best skies of all are those full of imagination as shapes come forth and are gone in the blink of an eye . . .

A pink marshmallow puff on January 1st

Days may pass with the subtle-hued sunsets, then one day the clouds will be like a bowl of bear's porridge, just right, and the fireworks of a blazing sunset commence.  Sometimes the spectacle lasts just minutes, other times it goes on for an hour or more and the show is spectacular beyond imagination.  Often, I am found sitting at my west facing window waiting to discover what the show of the day will be!  Many are the times I get caught unawares too, for what starts out slow and pale will suddenly gather momentum and intensify with depths of colour that often belie the northern latitudes where I live. 

Stormy January 2nd

The blue emerges with contratrails January 2nd

January 2nd Turner~esque

 For the new year, I decided to try to record the daily event we mostly take for granted, that goes unnoticed, with my camera.  It seemed a natural progression to offer a weekly blog, with at least seven images of the evening skies, sometimes more as the beauty that is there for the taking shifts and changes so that moments later a very different awe inspiring sky is offered.  There may even be a noteworthy sunrise from time to time.  So, Gentle Reader, here are the first few images that capture the mood of the changing skies this first week of 2012 . . .

A hare leaps across a wintery sky on January 3rd

or build a castle in the airy blue . . .

 but on January 4th the New Year brought a wild and windy storm . . .

and January 5th brought calm and gentle grey that quickly turned into a vibrant artist palette blue with shock of pink

upon Epiphany the sun rose in the East with coloured sky to welcome Magi three . .

and lipstick stripes for the evening of January 6th

and finally . . .

 

the seventh day of January brought a gentle grey . . . oh! how I look forward to what next week brings, the subtle changes, the variety each day!