I learned the tilt of ordinary afternoons, the quiet routes we used to take Your laugh would lift the corners up, and make the air unbreak Lately there’s a change in how the light leans, a ripple through the room Like someone opening a different door, and leaving less to bloom (“ahhh…”) I watch the slow rotary of faces, they enter in a line They offer louder conversation, they smooth the roughened time I count the ways the evening bends, and fold my hands to wait (“stay”) (“stay with me”) When the light shifts in the doorway, you move like summer news And I can feel the hours change, a softer kind of bruise They come with easy, polished lines, they talk of sudden plans And I keep measuring the quiet, with these waiting hands (“ooh—”) (“hold on”) (“hold on”) I find my footprints in their shadow, where once our steps were two They stand like mirrors in the doorway, and shade the light I knew You smile and something in the room shifts, a conversation turns so slight I count the pauses as they gather, and hold the narrow night (“ahhh…”) They bring their stories, bright and quick, with lines like polished wood And every measured compliment tries hard to make it good I pace the small and honest rooms, and learn to read the mood (“mine…”) When the light shifts toward the doorway, it colors what I know And easy laughter spills like rain, and moves me from the glow They promise evenings dressed in gold, they promise something new But I keep tracing where you falter, and count the ways it’s true (“ooh—”) [Solo] (“ooh”) I opened every drawer of morning, and found the little notes we'd made But paper crosses other hands now, and the page begins to fray If leaving moves like practiced footsteps, I’ll learn to stand the while (“we will”) When the light shifts in the doorway, it tells the story clear That pieces of the evening go, and bring the strangers near They speak like new horizons, they promise borrowed days I learn how to hold the smaller truths, and move through soft refrains
