Heather was thirteen,
A green-eyed, red-haired, pale-faced girl.
I saw her once-once long ago,
She was so pretty, sweet and sad-
Where did she go?

Susan was fourteen,
A brown-eyed, brown-haired, pink-faced girl.
I loved her once-but never told-
When I was young,
She was so beautiful, merry and bold-
Why did it ever fold?

Anne was fifteen,
A hazel-eyed, dark-haired, pallid-faced girl.
I smiled at her-just passing by,
When a mere youth,
She was so lovely, winsome and shy.
But she did die.

Sharon was sixteen,
A blonde-haired, blue-eyed, freckled girl.
She won my heart-when I was a teen,
She was so gorgeous, wild and free-
Her face-it always stayed with me.

Karen was seventeen,
A chestnut-haired, grey-eyed, milk-faced girl.
She spoke to me-to my surprise,
A single time-when I too was 17,
The path to joy was in her eyes-
And what did it mean?

I feel that they must still exist,
As perpetual, everlasting, teenagers.
Floating or flying in timeless space,
As they so richly deserve to-
For the calibre of their innocence and hope,
And the poignant truth,
Of their ephemeral loveliness,
Sweetness and new-dawn beauty.
Or for the strange assonance,
Of the remembered moment when I saw them,
Knew them-understood them each.
And for the brief glow,
They gave to the world.
To this evil and wicked and beautiful,
Wonderful, transcendent world.

Heather, Susan, Anne, Sharon, Karen.
Thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen.
You’re teenagers, forever.
And I am too, with you.

Dancing on orange-pink, sunset, clouds.
Or in the silver-blue, moonlit, summer skies.
With such infinite teens delight.
It was the best light of living,
That I loved,
And you loved too.

And that-I think-
Is the way that it should be.

Still-when I think of all those and other,
Beautiful-departed, teenage girls.
Of yesterday, today and tomorrow-
To me-it seems such an awful,
And terrible crime.