waxy thoughts

five red candles

dimly lit the paper

as I wrote to you

my tears

their waxy rivulets

melted together

the dying thoughts

as we slowly burnt down

to our beginnings

eventually

finally

both went out

only to be read

by the darkness

that swallowed them

(started on the 4th June 1993 - when I used to write by candlelight)

ask them to leave

loneliness and sadness

have to be called out

and cursed

not diluted

or ignored

not mistaken for something else

or imagined away

as you cannot ask them to leave

unless you know their names

another's warmth

when I close my eyes

when a face becomes

just flesh

that is when

I replace the silence

with your voice

nakedness is my need

but your voice

is my lover

this human hunger

that leads me to these arms

never fills me

and never touches

what I once found in you

only in the mornings

in the uncomfortable silence

of a cold dying heart

do I face my self-loathing

for betraying your love

and as I close these doors

I realise that leaving you

will be all I will ever know

the time traveller

he wanders back
to the moment he fell
and observes the man he knew
his mind recalls the act
but his eyes see the crime
fresh and undisturbed by time

he unwinds the hours back further
and steps in to confront himself
but he does not know this man
and this man will not listen

as he walks away from himself
he suddenly recalls the stranger he once met
the one with his father's face
and with the eyes hollowed out by pain