Saturday, August 12, 2006

Equatorial Night Lights

Yesterday I had the fortune to be able to witness (from a reasonably clear vantage point, to boot) the New Caledonia fireworks display for the SFF.

Truly a spectacle, I should say, more so because I don't think I've ever seen fireworks up close before, feeling the urban crush of others around, the mass of people congregating to see and to be excited, the deep reverberations shivering up my legs as cannonade after cannonade of gunpowder-packed fireworks were projected up into the sky to burst in a myraid of coloured streamers of fiery light. There were the usual skybursts of red and golden, and those with two or many colours. There were shimmering cascades of molten frisbees spinning out into the night. There were golden showers of sparkling waterfalls and cunningly aimed explosions that seemed bent on roaring towards us before being consumed by the darkness. There were red ones that burst, and the showers that they released burst once more, creating chain reactions of crimson rain. Smoke obscured good photographs and highlighted others, and deep red shone off their cavernous plumes, and long trails, reminiscent of crashing aeroplanes or crop-dusting aircraft, spun off in many directions. The spectators were kept, enthralled, for ten short minutes as bursts of fireworks ascended in majestic beauty. After that, of course, it was all chaos.

***

The morn still bleeds tears of mist for the revelry of the past night.

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