Old Photos

photograph candle key - for Stormy

When time weighs heavy on my eyelids
and thoughts shatter against words
like empty glasses,
I thirst for the song
of the doorbell,
off key.

Famished for friends,
I gape into faded albums
with a whiff of the old world,
searching for a temple
among the ruins.

With tears to salt the memories within,
I race across the pages,
in a dash stretched through decades,
watching the faces inside picture windows.

Mind orbits around ancient loves
to wonder if I could ever see
these people again
and plead for small attentions,
even in dreams,
in the darkness,

for when the circuit is shorted,
and fuses blow all around,
photographs are candles
to light up the night.