Poem: Seven Years to Build Courage
A short poem about my first crush, and the resulting heartbreak I felt after speaking to her.
Note:- This is my first attempt at a poem! So I’m no Shakespeare, yet.
Seven years, it’s been Seven years since I first saw you,
Seven years before I spoke to you,
Seven years to build my courage,
brick by brick.
Anxiety, nervousness, embarrassment, a bit of shame, fear of rejection,
the feelings I was haunted by whenever I’d think about you,
Seven years,
it took to overcome them.
I loathed the regrets I’d have, if I didn’t speak up,
Realised the depth of my feelings,
and knew I had to resolve them,
and so I spoke to you,
for the first time in Seven years.
You probably never knew me,
we never spoke in college,
save for the few glances I gave you.
God knows from where I managed to build this courage,
After a few days of chatting, that you responded so kindly to,
I felt I knew you quite well,
And you now knew a bit about me as well.
I felt like a hero,
making fantasies about us together,
and therein lies the problem with men(or is it just me?):
we run too fast before eventually crashing,
and reality catches up with us.
You told me you were with another man,
“Am I not grateful?” you asked, “To have met such a man as my boyfriend!?
What am I supposed to say to this!?
And yet, when we spoke on the phone,
for over two hours,
I felt strong regrets,
What if, I had this courage back then?
What if, I had spoken to you back then?
What if, I had shared my feelings with you back then?
What could have been?
Fantasising again!
reality is not too far behind me,
it catches me & puts me in my place,
when we finally see each other.
“You seem to be too scared”, you said,
when I claimed to be a teetotaller,
“You seem to be a nerd!”, you said,
when I said I love watching movies.
What is going on!?
It felt like a gun being fired into my heart,
What is this feeling!?
Every single word you say seem to be stabbing me in the heart!
I don’t know how to react!
I am left alone on the bus back home,
pondering over this assault on my identity,
cause that’s what it was,
an assault on me, my identity, who I was.
Now I know,
the answer to What If,
What if I had the courage back then?
I would have known you weren’t the one.
What if, I had spoken to you back then?
I would have known we were too different.
What if, I had expressed my feelings back then?
I could have moved on earlier in life.
The assault hurts still,
like radiation left behind after an explosion,
but the lessons will remain:
grow from these pains, get used to them.
It actually feels amazing, to feel this pain and move on,
It feels nice to grow and become a better man,
a more mature person.
I wish you the best in your life, for you have given me a good lesson,
I have my own path to forge ahead,
new people to meet and love,
new memories to make,
a life to lead.
Thank You!
Thank You for coming to my poetry session!
If you want to know more about what goes on in my brains, you can visit maheshswayamprakash.medium.com to read more of my articles!
