The Thief, Time

There's more time to feel
when you're fifteen.
Hair between fingers,
thighs under tables but
most of all, words.

I miss feeling the words
of a song reach
into my chest
and pull it, beating, out
to the stark evening air.

The freshness of a lyric,
the cool, crisp cut
of poetic pain.
The emphatic euphoria
of teenage joy,
caught, picked and
wrapped in four words.

Responsibility, pressure and
the thief, time,
take the words and
the breath
and leave us
unable to express