Early Risen, Snoozing Strategy, Nature's Daily Masterpiece

In my frequent search for new adventures, I set my alarm for 5:30 instead of 6 this morning, so I could snooze 3 times, feel good about it, and not be rushed. I enjoy a relatively relaxed morning routine; I am most definitely not the 'roll out and run' type.

Freshened, lunch packed (last night's feasting remains), and warmly bundled, I snagged the 6:28 bus to the metro. I've taken the week off from bicycling to see if my mysterious knee pain (I recall no trauma whatsoever) subsides. I rode the M2 to Nørreport, disembarked, and boarded the 6:55 Regionaltog (an earlier run of the train I took in the Jan. 29 post) and headed out to Roskilde.

The inspiration for this post came from this morning's sunrise, which I first noticed on the 600S bus from Roskilde station to Risø. This far north on the globe, and in this season, Sol does little more than hint at its coming until about 7:30. Most days there's cloud cover smothering in a uniform and decidedly heavy blanket, but Friday the 13th began clear and sharp with Jupiter in the southeast standing out starkly. The thin lines of cloud laying low in the east delayed the full light till 8, but their concert performance with the sun today brought to mind an effect I really enjoy. I see this same symphony of color and light back home (and it stirred up memories) looking from Denver toward the flatlands of Colorado at dawn. I regret forgetting my camera so I'll do my best to paint a verbose 'picture:'


A spectrum of new gold to fiery red blossoms out in quiet prelude, just above the trundling farms and fields. It seems as a cathedral roof painted in scenes of graphic violence, looking down on the timid and basal landscape. A gray and blue mist floats amongst the naked tree branches, permeating and concealing their leafless shame in swathes of dimness.

The hazy panorama is contrasted by the sharp mechanical clarity of a wind turbine breaking away to the heavens, its perfectly circular arc stirring up the moisture-laden air and appearing to poke at the sky’s grandeur—a strangely comical coincidence of perspective, as how distant stars meet in seemingly close constellation symmetries.

All this earthly climate is made low and insignificant in the presence of the Great Show conducting at near-infinite distance. There, on celestial canvas, there is a slowly churning lava field. The dark clouds silhouetted there are like the stringy islands and fat blobs of semi solid stone riding in acrid molasses seas of fire and sulfur. Their carbonic, pyritic, and basaltic brethren beneath already given over to liquefaction’s maddening call. These topside remainders futilely restrain the blazing inferno beneath, backed by reinforcements of cooler atmospheres above.

The magmatic heart relentlessly rises into being, wonderful burning color cascading off it as freely as ticker tape in a grand parade. As it ascends, its misshapen captors waver and fall back, riding along at entropy’s swift commands to regroup and press again from cooler vantage. In these moments of change more warm, red light is cast out into freedom, bringing with it legions of heat that warp the very air into ripples of nonconformity. The sweet disease of chaos spreads further into order’s domain, both sides executing their actions with the calm sense of inevitability.

The patina of snow in the foreground field greedily snatches up morsels of this generous shining substance and flings it along to seer’s eyes, desperately trying to proclaim itself as the splendor's source. The ever-mounting brilliance rising o’er its incessant treachery snuffs out these silently screaming lies.

In the west, the waxing moon nears its vanishing point and swells to double size, well fed by curvature's distortion. Its pitted face is like a clouded mirror, poorly reflecting the dawn's bountiful hues and appearing as a rotten orange discarded from the picker’s basket. It insolently flaunts its dull decay as a farewell to the waking world.

I must be content with this lesser and disturbing vista as I travel down the road to work.

Yet, not all is bad in the western view. A fleet of windowpanes faces east; their straight and serious hides catch quick to smolder in the dawn's tremendous gaze. They are both mirrors outward, like golden armor, and windows inward, belying great furnaces running hot. The effect is fleeting and in a moment their polished blackness returns, as if such glory had never graced them. Such flippancy!

I pause at my building’s door for a final glance. A cold breeze slides over my face and fingertips, and I see at last the immense intensity is unleashed, ready to singe corneas and make blind husks of unfortunate retinas. I turn with a smile.

Full day is here again, overly hasty and precisely punctual all at once.


Thank you God for blessing me with eyes.

Back to work and a new day! Farewell.