Night (Philip Hunter)

Waking

All of us associate night with the colour black. Darkness falls again across our portion of the Earth and we experience black, whether immediately, slowly, at the edges of our sight. Putting aside discussion of whether black is a colour, we stay silent instead. Even when we find ourselves in total black at night, so-called pitch black, in our minds we believe in something else. We expect something other than black. After all, we’ve had all day to think about it. Our eyes strive to discern. We are at work with black. We may dwell at length on black. Any shade may be a lineament. Over there the city glows for miles across hills and plains. It haunts itself with facades and overlit roads. It can faze out the stars, this earthly constellation of millions of lights. We stare into boxes of light, as though not enough light faced our lives. Still, the darkness is enough and we draw the blinds. Over there the country rests, out of sight. Even moonlight unevenly describes each feature of the country, when it appears full from clouds. The rest of the time is half-guesses. Yet little creatures underground bear the light inside them. Vehicles flash and waver and fall short behind a contour, or reappear. Trees must be lit if we discern their outlines, though darkness falls. Larger creatures take their bearings after the passing of cool of day. A satellite or an insect makes its earnest bid. We believe, in our minds. All of us associate with the night.  

Dreaming

We appreciate how black is a colour like all other colours. We open up to one of our main elements. We relearn the first place we are in, even before our birth. Night is half our lives. The outlines of things we are to define have turned into one of the many colours we call black. It is time to imagine. Trees of night enclose their secrets. Once more they co-ordinate and rarely take to visitors. They are a highway for nocturnals. Birds never cease to surprise us because surprise is about never ceasing to surprise. They draw us out of ourselves. Their sounds become the true measure of space at night. Their sight is better than black. We are waiting. In order to spare further argument, we accept for now that black is a colour. Night sky itself is eloquent on the subject. We are waiting and it is the night begins our waiting, gives waiting a start. Distance becomes a matter for mapmakers, navigators, and other riveted Enlightened individuals. While we breathe in this night of black, until day is a memory we are pleased to be away from. It will be many hours before those memories are brought to life again, when blackness slowly breaks open again into yellows, greens, blues, browns, reds. As darkness edges away from daybreak.

Night Paddocks – Wimmera 2 (Philip Hunter)