First light at dawn
The first faint grey arriving in the eastern sky — the edge of the day before the sun itself.
First light at dawn in a dream is the dream's image of the edge of the day before the sun itself. The sky is no longer black and is not yet bright; the shapes in the room are returning, but the colours are not back. The dream brings first light when something in your life — a recovery after grief, an understanding arriving after a long uncertainty, a new phase that has not yet declared itself — is at the stage where the outline is back and the substance has not yet filled in. First light watched out of an east window is the dream affirming the patient kept attention. First light slept through, with the sun already up by the time the room is opened, is the dream noting that the small precise hour of return has been missed, and what is now visible is already the ordinary day.