There are times, in the eerie hours of the morning when the birds are awake but the sun is yet the slightest lightening from dark to gray, I hear breath breathing beside me.
The murmur of an inhale a moment before my own, the faintest drift of air on the back of my neck.
In the moment I wake, not yet awake but when I, too, have turned from dark to gray, the sound is warmly human. The gentlest rise and fall, the promise of just a little more rest.
I turn, as I did of a morning past. But there is no breath. The whisper of the shifting sheets and my own long sigh. Awake now, and gray, but no promise of rest.
Gosh Darn Sunlight 