God spoke once in the dark: dead sound in the dead silence. I turned in my sleep. I slept and sank away. Then breath by breath I rose a rigid skeleton of thought spread over all the night maintained by faith alone afraid to waken, nay, afraid to stir in sleep. I, face to face with my own image. Mine, Rock, thought, and rock. Concrete the flesh - it lay within me, turned, cold in the living sheets. Suspended on cold iron, branded on air.