A restless wind is on the prowl tonight. Like ghosts on a stormy night, she makes her presence felt almost as if by chance - in the way something prompts you to take a longer look at the unmoving mottled green outside the window, and how, staring, you suddenly realise how they aren’t still at all, but being shaken with a fury that is being completely muffled by the glass separating you from them.

Harried, harassed. Almost as if in exasperation. What answers does she seek?

The roads are emptying. Human presence has reduced to that of the odd silhouette or two hurrying home hastily, pulling their coats together. Dark, fragmentary and blurring into the backdrop like scattered personae in an oil painting.

She picks up a whiff of the sea now. Aha. Do I detect a hint of fish in it? Without waiting for an answer, the mind rushes headlong across the oceans, to water body west of home. Ah yes, the Arabian sea breeze on a warm summer night.

Pedestrian signs turn white for no one in particular. A few characters from the easel shimmer past, and a few faceless cars glide by. A fresh gust sends a few fallen leaves tumbling, and the abandoned Coca Cola cup scraping along a few feet. I find myself fiercely wishing everything would stop moving and everyone would go home, leaving only the trees, the wind and the sea to be the sole dramatis personae in this anguished performance that is biding its time.

The lights in the hills twinkle with an uneasy rhythm.

I recognise this wind only too well, and it is in her that I make my peace tonight.