the desire to influence the world
and the desire to be left alone

I remember her as a teenage girl
and I lay awake with my cell phone

memory lingers long
that first kiss at night’s ocean

even decades later
despite time’s travail and motion

White Nights and Gregory Hines
then alone just near the beach

taste still on my tongue
but perhaps I overreach

an ordinary first date
an ordinary teenage boy

but her brown hair beauty beckons
decades later still summons joy