Fifteen

Fifteen, a sticky age

for us young boys back then

in more ways than one.

Girls, legs and breasts

loomed larger than football

or cricket in the maelstrom 

of hormones orbiting our loins.

You were ‘the’ girl, the one

holding court on the grass, we 

suitors, littering your gaze

in that warm summer

of L-plate love and lust.

How beautiful you were,

how curious were we?

Oblivious 

to the cards we would draw

the decisions we’d make

the paths taken.

Now fifty-years on

we meet once each year,

with our partners of course,

those same old faces

knowing, reminiscing,

reliving the aroma of grass

the warm stroke of that sun

the unsatisfied ache, whilst

keeping precious secrets safe

*

© Graham Sherwood 10/2019