The world wakes slowly,like a wound learning to breathe.
I walk through pale light that isn't light,through air that hums like a dying prayer.Every step leaves a mark that fades before I see it,as if the earth no longer believes in my weight.
The frost has turned to glass,and the sky hangs low—a ceiling painted with sleep.
I listen,but the silence only folds deeper.It curls around me,gentle,almost kind.
Somewhere beyond the horizon,a sound rises—not a song,not yet,just the memory of something that might have been human.
I pause.The light changes.The ground exhales.
And for a momentI think I see another shadow beside mine—but when I blink,there is only me,and the hollow dawnstretching forever.