Dan Hill: Fourteen Today

Fourteen today, and you went dancing.
Music mixed with laughter, and boys can be so immature.
They made you drink a bit too much,
Everything's a blur to feel and touch.
Did he really like you? Well, how can you be sure enough?

Twenty-three today, and all your friends are getting married.
You say they're so scared of being alone,
So self-righteously you march through teachers' college.
Still so much in life you gotta get to know,
Seems like everybody's so content to move so slow.

And when you think you've got your life so well-controlled, it slips away.
And the years, like raindrops falling from your life, are washed away,
washed away.
And you're so brilliant, you're so gifted, so sensitive, so strong,
As you hide behind your barricade of words,
But no one got close enough to you to have ever heard.

I met you at a party.
You were drunk and full of world advice, and I was getting nervous.
And you said you had a child who was a genius,
And you smiled as the living room transformed into your circus.

Someone whispered you were 39 today,
A face so young, eyes so old. You collapsed into the corner
Like somebody up on verbs, you near seduced me with your verbs as I reached
out for you,
You said over and over,
"Oh, when you think you've got your life so well-controlled, it slips away.
And the years, like raindrops falling from your life, are washed away,
washed away."
And you're so brilliant, you're so gifted, so tragic and so wrong,
As you hide behind your barricade of words,
But you know, no one got close enough to you to have ever heard.

Children come home from school, shout and laugh with all their life.
Shut them out fast before you think of the past, turn out all of your lights.
Go to bed, go to sleep, don't think, don't feel as the nighttime owns a
prayer.
But maybe somewhere deep inside there's some meaning aching to be shared.

Fourteen today, and you were dancing