Sleeping Bear

I lie awake in the cold hush of the tent,
eyes tracing the faint curve of canvas above me,
trying to quiet the restless tide of thought
and failing.

Footsteps, soft as breath on frost, approach.
A quiet knowing settles in my chest
before the zipper even sighs open.

“John?” I whisper.

“Shhh,” he answers
and the silence that follows says everything.

He carries the night’s chill with him,
hands like winter slipping beneath the warmth I’ve made,
searching, finding.
My breath catches,
a small storm in the stillness.

Then, sudden, certain,
he gathers me close,
as though the cold itself were chasing him.

No more words,
only the rhythm of closeness,
of shared warmth in a world gone quiet.

Later, when stillness returns,
I turn, expecting absence
but he lingers.

An arm drapes over me,
pulling me into something softer now,
and sleep comes easy,
like falling into deep water.

I wake again to the fragile edge of dawn,
the world holding its breath.

“John…” I murmur,
a question more than a name.

We listen.

Beyond the thin walls of canvas,
a distant, uneven snore breaks the silence.

“Stay here,” he whispers,
slipping into the cold once more
only to return moments later,
quiet laughter in his voice.

“Division’s tent. Not a bear, he’s snoring” he says.

And we fold back into warmth,
stifling our laughter beneath the sleeping bag,
as the morning waits just outside.

when fireline funships are hidden but not forgotten. thank you for the fun memories John.