Threshold

The sky doesn't break into night— it erodes, grain by grain, like old paint on a shutter.

Purple deepens. The birds remember they had names once, before the dark reclaimed the syllables.

I stand at the margin, neither here nor after, watching the light negotiate with shadows, knowing one will always win.

But not tonight. Tonight they hold, suspended in this amber pause, this breath between what was and what comes after.