Breath-taking beauty

I think it was this same day, I took Lillian to the Shrine. The weather was strange. Our hemisphere of sky was full of dust blown in by hot winds. Everything was grey. At four in the afternoon, when we went out, there were some clouds, and sparse rain. The western sky, where the sun was, looked like luminous marble.
As we came around the western side of the Shrine, I looked up and saw the Jacaranda tree, a black lacy silouhette against the softly lit sky. It was just about to bloom, and the roundness of the buds gave grace and promise to the repeating patterns of the branches and twigs. Over to my left stood dark cypresses like the ones in the photo in the link (maybe the same ones). There was a fairly strong breeze. As I stood looking a few birds rose up out of the cypresses, up above the Jacaranda. They threw themselves into the wind, and rode it back, and then climbed again and rode again, like game, trilling together. I could only see the outline of bodies. It was elegant, the lower edge of the wing curving down to the body and then a fish-tail shaped tail. More joined them after a time. Lillian was looking at something else. It was such an arresting moment, the sight, the sound, the movement, the feeling of the wind. It made me so happy.