To the ones I never chose. #Poetry

 Silent love, unchosen hearts, and the quiet guilt that lingers — where memories bind like rusted chains, and every glance echoes what was never said.

I am writing a letter,
a letter to each lover
of mine,
who silently liked me
even when I wore a not-so-fancy uniform.

To the one who
secretly, silently stayed in the dark room,
while I was lost in my own world, overconsumed.

To the hearts
that quietly carried the pain — 
of being understood at least once,
who secretly bled black each day,
each time those eyes clung to me

in hope,
in desire,
hoping to find a destiny.
To each ache that never learned
the language of its own heartache.

To the eyes that clasped their tears,
who searched for me in the crowd,
who held on to me with pure love
in an age of gentleness and innocence,
while all I chose — 
I chose to look away.

To those lips
that whispered and chanted my name,
lost foolishly between games of Flames,
hiding from everyone — on the last pages
of your copies, benches carrying it
as if it were shame.

Though I am not sure if I understand it — 
the intensity or the depth,
the pain, the loss, or
the quiet distance between us, as if
I am the length, and you are the breadth — 
Yet I carry this unknown, unspoken blame.

So, to each one of you,
each one of them,
each one I never chose — 
I see you now.
I hear your hum,
growing louder and louder,
echoing in my mind, echoing the silence.

Even though the rains have long dried up,
yet in my eyes — 
as memories flash,
as faces light up,
as emotions crawl into my skin,
as I hear your name,
as I see you —

I see myself,
standing in defiance,
crushed by the weight of quietness,
a mind consumed in guilt,
a heart learning its violence.

And I try — 
yet fail — 
to write the weight of those gazes:

how they stayed,
how they marked,
how they never really left.

A love I was never part of,
Yet one I remain bound to — 
in chains that once felt gentle and pure — 
now rusted, ruthless against my skin,
tightening with each day
until every name begins to sound like yours,
every glance of yours reveals them — 
and they stay.
They all stay, brushing against my body
and they never leave.

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