Modern Romanticism

With a blown-out candle
that started our doubts,
I've been drinking in
the white, the immaculacy
of a streak of hope.

I've been drunk on
whatever comes next,
with the future in chains,
with the past
put to its blame.

I've been leaving sand
for time to be told,
for faces to be revealed
in sudden recognition.
For I want to see
who I've kept it from.

I want them to be
circling in better thoughts.

For another spark,
a lit fuse, where a bomb
is just one more plunge
in the waters of
delicate opportunity.

You held this hand,
where now you collect
autumn's brittle leaves,
like angels turned to dust,
like buildings with rust.

You dropped me in a puddle,
as I swam across it.
I was always breathing
what little I might reuse.