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First lovel like first dawn
Sweet and pure, as beautiful as magic
Always remembered with a tender smile
Dreamy eyes and a soft laugh.
First romance remisnisced of fondly
No matter how it turns out.
Always bittersweet, always endearing,
has a special place in your heart forever.
First romantic stirrings and tender pains
The awakening of a heart.
First feelings, strange and oversweeping,
New feelings, not understood.
Wonderful and painful memories of a love long dead,
but never forgotten.
First love like first sun
Lighting up a brand new day.
Crossing the threshold into adulthood
Looking at life in a whole new way.
--Valentine's Day, 1994, age 15

Young Heart

Yeats asked to tread softly
I plead the same.
My heart's still learning
the rules of the game.
I'm still discovering
The questions to ask.
Don't burden me with inquiries
For answers I don't have.
What we are together
I couldn't say.
Like life, we change.
Like love, we stray.
There's a hunger, a pain,
A void I can't fill.
Are you my answer?
Can I go against my will?
My heart is so young--
It hasn't yet learned.
Tread softly when you answer--
Please don't let me get burned.
--8/3/96

And after the final break-up...

With you, Without you

Life with you was a constant give and take,
I gave, you took.
You were a baby bird with a voracious appetite--
Your mouth was always squacking for more.
You tugged and tugged on my arms
Till my knuckles scraped the ground,
Like a gorilla.
You never gave anything in return
Except grabbing for more.

And yet, without you,
The house is quiet.
No more birdsong, raucous or otherwise.
My arms only reach as far as they did,
Never trying to give more then they had to.
My life should be better,
Happier,
Now that I have the peace and quiet
Only some deserted, wayward island sees.
And yet, without you, I find
That I have the world to give,
And no one to receive.
--3 March, 1997