In the gathering gloom of a February dusk, we stand and wait by a frozen lake, eyes peeled heavenward above the Pagoda, the coot’s creak and the blackbird’s cluck our only company, under layers of wool and wax, a drip at our nose, and cheeks reddened with cold. Beyond, red and white flecks of light sweep along the H6, the muffled hum of other lives, other places to be. But we are here, and this fleeting moment in time’s grand march is ours.

From nowhere, a few at first, speck after speck, then more and glorious more, a flight of fancy that grows into a whirling, twirling, whooshing hither-thithering. Such joie de vivre! No rhyme nor reason, their dance flows with the nonchalant ease of the vibrant, swaggering under a pale half-moon. A plane drifts overhead, solid and staid in a purpling sky. And still they dance. Look — Snake! Shark! Caterpillar! Ball! Moustache!

Mesmerised by grace and beauty, we forget that nothing lasts forever. An unseen command – but whose? – and they begin to descend, so close you might reach out and hold them tight forever. Their white noise drowns a siren’s distant wail. The dance slows, mellows, and they drop to roost, spent clockwork toys winding down, rustling the reeds by the Hospice. Fading until all is silent, all is stillness, and only the memory remains.