More than the watchman waits for the morning ..

Till the morning comes we will wait,

Stiff in cold darkness,

Wary of old betrayals, but believing,

Still, against every sense, that morning comes.

We remember daylight

As children remember a dream where grass was greener,

Through the foggy lens of memory

Focusing on hope.

Have the stars grown paler?

Is that a breath of wind in the stoic silence?

Has something moved and changed, do the birds sleep lighter?

Is the east a smudge less dark?

Breathe in, breathe out.

You must understand, we do not speak our questions,

Lest the silence snaps and the earth retreats from turning;

Lest the flowers clench more shut, and the air grows harder,

Lest we betray our faith’s fragility.

Still we wait for the morning.

Our limbs grow heavy-stiff, and we wait for morning.

Our throats are tension-dry, and we wait for morning.

Our clocks crawl slow as ice, and we wait for morning.

We do not own the stars.

Softer than a whisper

Comes song of distant bird – did we really hear it?

Do the small things of night turn at last to slumber?

Can gritted eyes see true? Is the wan moon sinking?

Wake angel hosts, awake!

See the sun in promise

Send its outriders forth to push back the night

Now the horizon smiles in pearly greyness

At last, it surely comes! The Light! The Light!