Journals of Winter

Ok, some of you here may have commented on my original 'A Winter Midnight'.

Anyways, I found writing that piece really fun, and so I decided to start journals.

Basically, I just go outside [usually at night] and jot down what I see, hear, smell, feel and touch.

I have included the first entry (the original 'A Winter Midnight'). I know it's purplish, and I haven't edited it yet, so please critique that bit too!

Oh, and I will be adding these over the period of 7 days. I have only the first two here, so if you like them, check back to see more!

Entry one: A Winter Midnight. (Unedited)

The air was brisk and refreshing; the cold, clean, smoky perfume of a Winter midnight. The trees swayed gently with the frosty breeze and the moon shed a crystaline glow from it's lofty perch in the rose-coloured twilight.

I stood alone, a still figure amid the sea of short, well-trodden grass. And although the stars were lost in the faded, wispy clouds, every detail of the park was clear and bright, edged in silver.

I inhaled deeply, relishing the intense cold as it filled my lungs and throat. My hair floated on the wind, drifting around my face as I walked under the cover of the trees. In the shadows, I felt safe. The darkling shade swallowed me whole and steeped me in the deep mystery of the night; I felt alive like never before. Never had the grass felt so soft beneath my bare, frozen feet, never the moon so bright, cradled between the barren branches of a tree.

I felt the urge to run, and, with a last look at the darkness behind me, I sprinted across the field as if on winged feet. The sky deepened on one side to a purply-grey; the somber velvet that hid the stars in it's murky depths.

Too soon, the white boards of the hockey rink appeared before me. I slowed to a stop, a smile spreading across my face. It was so good to be alive.

Entry two: A Nocturnal Wonderland.

It's been so long since I've been outside this late. Yet everything is as I remember it from my last visit; beautiful, dark, inspiring.

The bench is hard and uncomfortable, but I don't want to sit up. I feel like I'm drunk on life, on the sharp, clear air.

Trees form a skeletal against the perfect rose-coloured sky.

They sway gently with the swollen wind, and I hear the occasional clack of wood on wood as they bump together.

There are no clouds, and the stars are lost in a sweet fog. My breath is an icy cloud of smoke, hazy grey before it is whisked into nothingness. I feel like I would stay here forever if only I could.

Maude flits like a shadow in front of me, and occasionally I catch the flash of amber from her eyes, the quiet drum of her tawny paws against the hard-packed earth. As I get up, my own footsteps are muffled in the dirty patchwork of grass, snow and mud. I stretch my arms towards the sky, and shiver as a cold draft whispers across my neck.

I break into a light jog, hair swishing, feet hitting the earth in a rhythmic pattern. Streetlights glow like fireflies, pooling a sickly light onto the crisp grass. I come to a stop under one of them and rest my cheek against the scaldingly cold metal.

Deep breaths pierce my throat like the daggers of Winter, a frosty bite that for me is both pain and pleasure.

The two halves of the sky; harvest rose and dark cobalt, meeting and smudging together like the pastels of the night. Each side is beautiful.

Once again I feel the urge to run. I am restless, full of a burning energy. My run is more aggressive now, more powerful. Maude keeps pace with me, a dark streak across the grass.

The chain-link fence gleams dully, a massive wall of spikes and barbs. I dare not pass it.

There is a puddle in the baseball diamond, but the chill of Winter has turned it into a sheet of frosted moonlight.

The sullen glow of a streetlight is caught, frozen in time, within the depths of the ice.

The distant drone of cars is lost to my ears, mesmerized as I am by this nocturnal Wonderland.