9 November 2013 - Evolution of a sunset

This evening I caught yet another rock squirrel. I put him in the trunk and drove up to Neff's Canyon to let him go.  As I was letting him out of the cage I looked up and saw the sun was just about to set and I could tell it was going to be magnificent. I drove home, got my camera and went back. I took a couple of pictures, walked back to my car and took a last look-- but wait a secy! It was changing so quickly, I had to walk back to the overlook and take yet more pictures to capture the transition. I ended up watching until it was almost dark. 

Here is the evolution from yellow to molten!

Moments like this fill me with a fierceness of emotion. 

Best stated here in this poem by C.K. Williams. 

Droplets

Even when the rain falls relatively hard,
only one leaf at a time of the little tree
you planted on the balcony last year,
then another leaf at its time, and one more,
is set trembling by the constant droplets,

but the rain, the clouds flocked over the city,
you at the piano inside, your hesitant music
mingling with the din of the downpour,
the gush of rivulets loosed from the eaves,
the iron railings and flowing gutters,

all of it fuses in me with such intensity
that I can't help wondering why my longing
to live forever has so abated that it hardly
comes to me anymore, and never as it did,
as regret for what I might not live to live,

but rather as a layering of instants like this,
transient as the mist drawn from the rooftops,
yet emphatic as any note of the nocturne
you practice, and, the storm faltering, fading
into its own radiant passing, you practice again.  

And speaking of transitions, let's talk about the moon. While I was gawking at the sunset, the moon was rising in the southeast over Mount Olympus. 

 I was admiring the split moon, and how straight the vertical line was in the graying sky. This was about 5:30pm.

But here is the surprise. Just now, thinking about bed, I glanced out the window and saw the moon had moved across the sky toward the northeast. 

The surprise is that the moon did not stay vertical, she rolled over on her back.  So now, at 11:40 pm she looks like this. Perhaps she is resting, too.

Note below:  Guess the sunset was more spectacular than normal. Today's (Sunday) paper featured a half page photo of the sunset similar to my last photo.