I woke up this morning (about an hour ago) with the last bits of shattered stained-glass beauty creeping reluctantly from my weary vision, the eclectic tumble of a thousand sights too perfect for words finally leaving me. I was glad - am glad - I am not up to dealing with that much perfection. It's painful in a way that I hadn't remembered things could be.

The day is still touched with occasional fragments of bliss - a sunbeam, the smell of dew, the shape my shadow makes when I turn a corner, half-awake and stumbling. Everything seems fresh, this morning. The world has been washed in tears, and it is clean and new, ready to begin again.

I don't feel proud of myself for last night - yes, I went quite thoroughly off the wagon, as it were, I even had a glass of cider to end the evening - but I don't feel regret, either. I can't regret seeing what I did, knowing what I did. I understand why people convert, I understand why meditation is so popular, why religion never really dies out. I grok.

It's morning now and although the burst of white-hot inspiration and the easy acceptance of everything good and bad is pulling out of my reach, I am left with a sense of Self that is beyond anything I have gained in years.

Breathe in...

...breathe out...

...and for just a moment a sunburst ignites, thoughts exploding, that one simple breath carrying me on gossamer wings into a dawn that holds every hope and every promise I have ever dreamed of.