Flower of the Dusk

The pines, darkly purple, towered against the sunset. Behind the hills, the splendidtapestry glowed and flamed, sending far messages of light to the grey East, where lay thesea, crooning itself to sleep. Bare boughs dripped rain upon the sodden earth, where thedead leaves had so long been hidden by the snow. The thousand sounds and scents ofSpring at last had waked the world. The man who stood near the edge of the cliff, quite alone, and carefully feeling theground before him with his cane, had chosen to face the valley and dream of the glory that, perchance, trailed down in living light from some vast loom of God's. His massive head wasthrown back, as though he listened, with a secret sense, for music denied to those who see. Joyful MemoriesHe took off his hat and stray gleams came through the deepening shadows to rest, likean aureole, upon his silvered hair. Remembered sunsets, from beyond the darkness of morethan twenty years, came back to him with divine beauty and diviner joy. Mnemosyne, thatguardian angel of the soul, brought from her treasure-house gifts of laughter and tears; thelaughter sweet with singing, and the bitterness of the tears eternally lost in the Water ofForgetfulness. Slowly, the light died. Dusk came upon the valley and crept softly to the hills. Mist driftedin from the sleeping sea, and the hush of night brooded over the river as it murmuredthrough the plain. A single star uplifted its exquisite lamp against the afterglow, near theveiled ivory of the crescent moon. Sighing, the man turned away. "Perhaps," he thought, whimsically, as he went cautiouslydown the path, searching out every step of the way, "there was no sunset at all."The road was clear until he came to a fallen tree, over which he stepped easily. The newsoftness of the soil had, for him, its own deep meaning of resurrection. He felt it in theswelling buds of the branches that sometimes swayed before him, and found it in the scentof the cedar as he crushed a bit of it in his hand. Easily, yet carefully, he went around the base of the hill to the street, where his housewas the first upon the right-hand side. The gate creaked on its hinges and he went quicklyup the walk, passing the grey tangle of last Summer's garden, where the marigolds had diedand the larkspur fallen asleep