My favourite sunset so far was after my first date. It was a day that leaped out of the pages of a truly perfect book, and the sunset? The sunset felt exactly how a sunset should feel – warm, fuzzy, dreamy, soothing, perfect. It wasn’t a particularly stunning sunset for the eye; in fact, it had just rained, but what made it stand out was that ticklish feeling of happiness for what was a perfect day, mixing with the sadness that it was coming to an end.
Mono no aware (Japanese) is the subtle sorrow felt when appreciating the fleeting beauty of life; and if you’ve seen a pretty sunset, you’ve felt Mono no aware. There’s many songs written on sunsets im sure, but the greatest of them all has to be Miriam Makeba’s Lakutshon Ilanga. This classic has the slippery smoothness of a sunset that’s slipping you into the evening, gently disarming you of the demands of the day. Mam’ Miriam’s voice dances slowly with the piano, in a healing duet communicating a simple, grounding message.
The song itself simply says, translatedly loosely:
The Sun will set.
The cows will return.
I will think of you. The sun will set.
The moon will appear, over the sea.
The birds will return. The sun will set.
I will go looking for you.
Within houses & on the streets.
In hospitals & in prisons.
Until i find you.
The sun will set, the cows will return, i will think of you – the sun will set.
It’s so assuring and can be interpreted in a hundred beautiful ways but i specifically love it for how grounding the message is. The day can take one through a million different paths, emotions, thoughts, battles, joys and yet none of these will ever change the fact that the sun will set, raising the moon after it. And that this will happen, every day, as long as there is an earth and a sun. It’s so stilling, the idea that there’s one moment within the day that is the catchment for all the moments from throughout the day, it’ll all fall into the warmth of the sunset that whispers to us “you are safe in your humanity” even through the chaos of life.
No two sunsets are the same, people everywhere experience the same sunset differently – to some it’s the time to return from the day’s shift during a live war, for others it’s a panaromic moment on day 2 of a honeymoon. And most times, for the ordinary human, it’s the time to return home after work, to start cooking for the family, to return home with the kids after a school sports match.. It’s the time for cows to return from grazing, for the firewood to begin crackling – for life to surrender us back to gentle reminders that it is well. Even when all isn’t well, the sunset comes to kiss our feet to tell us that despite everything being up side down with life – the earth isn’t broken, it still functions as it always has and you are safe within your humanity.
I love the afternoon into sunset time, it makes me feel so safe and calm. I also love music that makes me feel safe and calm. If Lakutshona Ilanga makes you cry for how beautiful it sounds, pack more tears for the following:
Luisito Quintero – Aquilla Coisas Toidas
berlioz – open this wall
Victor Masondo – As Promised
NIJI – Danni
what songs feel like a sunset (calmness & safety) to you?
Muse Journal 
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