• tab It was a bright morning. High in the green trees surrounding the little cottage, birds were singing a merry tune as the sunlight glanced over the hill and peeked through the leaves. The rainy night had passed; the air smelled fresh and crisp, and the hillside was teeming with life. Wildflowers bloomed all atop the grassy knoll, and the sound of a flute piped in cheerily from the other side of the cottage.
    tab Inside, a boy’s lips rested against the flute as it sang out its joyful melody. The boy’s mother sat nearby writing a letter at a sunny desk. In the kitchen an old woman servant bustled about preparing the morning meal. Even the wildlife living near the cottage was in high spirits. The deer pranced about with their fawns and a myriad of others joined in the dance with their own young. Everything I saw in that morning was teeming with life, the very air saturated with the promise of new beginnings.
    tab And in the bed that laid before my eyes, the sun so brightly shining on it through the windows, lay my beloved. Her eyes were closed as though in deep slumber and her cheeks were faintly pink. Her face, oh to me it was the most beautiful face in the world, a face I had prayed to see every morning for the rest of my life! Her visage looked peaceful, as though her dreams were pleasant. I knelt down by the bed and rested my head on the sheets, drinking in the smell of the morning, and the smell of my beloved’s perfume.
    tab And I wept. I wept until my eyes were sore, and then I wept again.
    tab The light of the rising sun was cruel. It showed me my greatest fear: my beloved was dead.
    tab It was a bright morning.