Can I not waste my youth on careful steps,  
on days that dissolve into the haze of sameness?  
Let me fling myself toward the edge of meaning,  
toward the sharp teeth of risk,  
and taste the blood of every mistake.  

Can I love you with a voice unbroken,  
a shout that shatters glass and wakes the earth?  
Let me strip away the thin gauze of decorum,  
the soft bindings of propriety,  
and wear my longing like armour,  
gleaming, unapologetic, defiant.  

Can I carry you in ways the world will see,  
your face etched in the silver at my neck.
a small, heavy sun  
pulling my body forward in its orbit.  
Not as a charm or a trinket,  
but as proof that I have known fire,  
that I have burned for something.  

I want to run with my youth clutched in my fists,  
like a thief stealing seconds from eternity.  
I want to strip it of its silks and jewels,  
let it stand bare in the rain,  
breathless, soaked in hunger,  
aching and alive.  

I will not waste this riot in my blood,  
this fleeting storm,  
this electric sky that darkens too soon.  

Let me spend it recklessly,  
on nights that leave us shaking,  
on mornings that blur at the edges,  
on the taste of your name whispered  
or screamed  
or spoken like prayer.  

Can I love you with the force of collapsing stars,  
with the weight of a thousand unsaid words,  
with a boldness that terrifies?  
Can I carry your face as my shield,  
your love as my battle cry?  

When the end comes—  
as it always does—  
let me look back and see the wreckage  
of a life lived like a tempest,  
its ruins shimmering in the sun,  
its echoes still singing in the air.  

Let me say I loved you  
loudly, fiercely, entirely.  
Let me say I did not waste a single breath.