Night crept in with dark brilliance, seeping into the earth below. A canopy of stars unfurled like a blanket across the sky. Over the far mountain reared the stallion, a deep purple armored with precious stones, now shining blue, now flashing red. I could see his silhouette in light, trace his wild mane, watch him kick the glacial peak, sending a milky dust into the cosmic air.

I had never seen the stars twinkle. I knew it only in a nursery rhyme, that old tune sung at the cradle. They existed there too, but we spewed smog and light with such oppression we blotted out the very stars themselves.

Somehow it surprised me, that towering glow. Somehow it blindsided me, that nature scene, pulling the air from my lungs in short gasps each time I stepped down from the porch; that undisturbed universe, never heeding the scratched protests beneath my feet.