Sixteen Candles.

Facing the birthday cake with sixteen lit candles, you sat. You closed your bright eyelids, you smiled, you made a wish. You opened your eyes, in one breath you blew out the candles. We clapped to the lovely tune of Happy Birthday! We danced around you among all the balloons and the confetti. Facing your black-framed photo I sat days and nights and hours: your lit candles still scatter light to all the far reaches of space. What was your wish that night, Sarina?...