Teenage Wisdom

I know fifteen-year-olds
who think of love
like breathing.
In and out
and easy
as changing shoes.
They fall like
raindrops
splatting broken hearted
to the hard ground
only to rise
dry-eyed
a moment later.
pitter patter
on the pavement,
little hearts
think love
is just a game.
but who am I to say
I know the way?
At fifteen I didn't fall
like that: I fell
the way a watermelon does
from twelve tall stories -
hard and fast and
inadvisably.
Now at nineteen I am splattered
at your feet
a mess of pulp and peel
and shattered shell.
It is a loftly spot
from which to sneer
at 'silly' girls
who get back up.