Images of love

Across the room a candle burns,

Cold spirit of a dying flame -

Alone upon a wasteland.

Slumped among distorted shadows

With eyes half-closed by drink,

My dreams have twisted in the light

That threads her picture on the wall,

And I have listened,

Listened for her footstep in the hall.

Or walking on a street at night

I recognise a figure lit

In the deep and empty pool

Of amber thrown around a face,

And then looked again

To see a stranger take her place.

Or lying sprawled across a bar

I hear her voice call softly,

Call out above the raucous crowd.

But as my stupor quickly clears

I stare about my ears deceived

My smoke-filled eyes half-blind with tears.

Or drunk, returning to my room

I contemplate a hopeless love

And watch her silent face appear

Within the sharp blue-fingered flame

And wonder,

Wonder if she knows my name.

Or when she beckons me to wake

And move her with a laughing kiss,

I stretch and blow her face away;

For in the flame a dreamer's mind

Can see her still,

But know what it can never find.

Across the room a candle dies,

Cold remnant of a lifeless flame -

Alone upon a wasteland.