A Walk in Beauty

My husband nudged me to get up earlier than my head was willing to lift from the pillow. “It’s time,” he said. We had agreed the night before to get up early to photograph an unusual sunrise dotted with glimpses of ebbing planets.

It sounded like a great idea the night before, but that morning I wasn’t so thrilled with the notion. I’m always the one up early, but my one day to sleep in was being taken away. I finally mustered the energy to get up and wash my face, change, and head out the door with my hubby and our photography gear.

Glancing toward the eastern sky on the drive to our photography destination, I was thrilled to see a couple of planets twinkling from the horizon. I was beginning to believe that the early morning start was going to be well worth the effort.

The planets we were vying to see were Venus, Jupiter, and Mars, aligned like jewels around a thinly sliced crescent moon. If you look closely, you can just make out two of them in the photograph above – one in the top right and the other to the left of the tree where the sky is turning from orange to blue.

It wasn’t long after we arrived before the sun began to rise and we were left with only the smallest glow of that crescent moon. It was quite a moving experience and reminded me of a poem, She Walks in Beauty. Read along with photographs of the sky transforming from predawn to sunrise.

She walks in beauty
George Gordon, Lord Byron

I. She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that’s best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellow’d to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

II.  One shade the more, one ray the less,
Had half impair’d the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,
Or softly lightens o’er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

III.  And on that cheek, and o’er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,
A heart whose love is innocent!