Thread Through the Dark

In that moment before the room fills with itself— before blue becomes blue, before the eye knows it is seeing—there is a sliver, a held breath, the narrow place where night still keeps one hand on the world.

I know it the way I know the weight of a word before it leaves the mouth, the shape of a face in the mirror's ghost, how hunger tastes like tomorrow.

The light comes anyway, relentless and kind, unspooling its thread through each dust mote, each corner, each trembling thing— and I follow it forward, toward the day, still dragging the dark behind me like a lover.