Warrior of Light

The room is full of candles,
tiny flickering lights,
each one inconsequential against a dark
that penetrates everything,
that creeps into your room
and smothers the beautiful things
that surround you,
robs you of color,
hides your path and leaves you to stumble
and wound yourself with every step.

You are familiar with this darkness,
at times too comfortable, at times
a warrior of light, sure somehow
if you apply flame to enough candles
you will drive it away
forever,
or at least, for the moment.

And that is enough,
for this is where you live,
not in the past,
not in the days ahead,
only now, in this moment of modest light,
of reclaiming what was once yours.
what you somehow cannot surrender.
You reach in the flickering light
as the candle next to you sputters and dies.
You reach and light one more,
and then another, a vigilant soldier
on the outpost of night.