In the Wake of a New Flame

I was not searching—

but the wind did,

through the trembling leaves of my silences.

Love,

not the loud kind that burns cities,

but the quiet flame

that remembers where the candle stood last night.

You arrived—not as thunder,

but as dew on a tired windowpane,

a suggestion of something tender

beyond the blur.

I have known love—

aged like old wine,

sweet in its stillness,

heavy with memory.

It knows my breath,

the forgotten corners of my sighs.

It never leaves,

but still,

I ache for the taste

of love made new.

This is the curse—

or perhaps the miracle:

we are always lighting matches