We think of day and night in symmetry, in endless succession but day was born from the long cold pre-Solar night and in the heat-death of the universe will collapse back into night once more; time will end. And so this, the ticking of a great clock, is an odd instant between two faceless expanses of darkness. The symmetry we feel between light and dark, morning and evening is just a brief chapter in which light almost holds darkness at bay. It has rained too heavily all day to go out and now as the dusk draws in I sit at the small table by the window, at the top of the stair. The maid has brought me a lamp, some quills and ink from my study. Perhaps now is my moment. In the street below I see figures struggle by against the hard sheets of rain, wrapped up in mackintoshes and scarves. No one will come to call on me this evening, the night will pass. I may wake in the rags of the dawn. I may crouch at the tideline in despair, tugging off my shoes, biting the surf.

– Geoff Sawers