noon
Tatsu did not ask that it be changed though , indeed , each recurrent dawn brought martyrdom to him . The sound of sparrows at the eaves , the smell of dew , the look of the morning mist as it spread great wings above the city , hovering for an instant before its flight , the glow of the first pink light upon his coverlid , each was an iron of memory searing a soul already faint with pain . The attendant often marvelled why , at this hour , Tatsu buried his face from sight , and , emerging into clearer day , bore the look of one who had met death in a narrow pass . At noon , when the window showed a square of turquoise blue , he grew to watch with some faint pulse of interest the changing hues of light , and the clouds that shifted lazily aside , or heaped themselves up into rounded battlements of snow . Quite close to the window a single cherry branch , sweeping downward , cut space with a thick , diagonal line . Silvery lichens frilled the upper surface of the bark , and at the tip of each leafless twig , brown buds -- small armored magazines of beauty -- hinted already of the spring 's rebirth . Life was all about him , and he hated life .