nothing like the sun

I have lost track of the days, the hours, the months...and wonder what it is going to take to revive me--to bring me back to reality.

The nurse is patting my face gently, "Wake up. are you awake?" she asks sweetly.
As I come to, I wonder if she ever thinks in the back of her mind,
"What if they don't? What if they never wake again?"
I decide not to be her first and allow myself to come back to full consciousness.

Flipping through my old friend Shakespeare tonight, I found several dried flowers pressed in the pages from a few year's past. The petals bruised and stained the pages of my favorite sonnets-- I opened to #130...
...I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
That music hath a far more pleasing sound.
I grant I never saw a goddess go,
My mistress, when she walks, tread on the ground.
And yet by heaven, I think my love as rare
As any she beliede with false compare.