FIRST LOVE

The dynamics of adolescent love, manipulated and controlled!

He meets you at the mill-gate,

thinking to pass by,

but caught

in your winsome trap,

stops to gaze,

fumble for silly words.

You smile in easy triumph

at his loss,

found in strangely

glad encounter,

wait, perhaps remember

with pleasurable irony

others who bent

to your regal will.

Tongue-tied boy squirms,

listening to the drum-beat

of a heart, etched

with enclosed fervour.

He dare not move,

for abject fear to reveal

the unchecked turmoil in

broken, bleeding flesh.