To All The Words I Wish I’d Said

To all the words I wish I'd said - 

I know how badly you wanted to come out

And rain fire on them with the ferocity of a thousand angry goddesses

Tell them what they deserved to hear

Show them the rage that is hidden

Behind the curtains of a harmless person

I wish to vomit you out more often than not

Because my pissed-off-meter is a hand grenade

Which I would have happily unleashed

If not for the fatal flaw

That stops it from leaving my hands

As I keep losing count of the number of times

I have been self-immolated by the fire of my own inhibitions

I know how badly you wished to say

"It wasn't my fault"

"It was you who brought this upon us"

"I tried my best, and you let us down"

But after a gut-wrenching struggle to creep out of my mouth

You gave up

And went back inside the ‘self-pity’ corner of my soul

While all that did come out was

"I'm sorry" -

An emotionless, mechanical jargon

Trapped in meaningless little pockets of air

To all the words I wish I'd said - 

I hope you know how I feel about people

And I guess you did hear the noise

Those butterflies made

As they played hide-and-seek in my stomach

When I saw her for the first time

Her lehenga swayed to the symphony

Of her tinkling jhumkas 

And her glittering eyes sang a cappella 

With my jittering fingers

All that was left for me to do

Was to go up to her 

And set you free 

I wish you know that confessing love

Doesn't change anything for me

But the only reason I am frightened of letting you out 

Is because you may change everything about me in her eyes.

To all the words I wish I'd said -

I know how badly you wanted to ask

"Why don't we talk?"

And how desperately you searched for an answer

Because I was busy making up the most hurtful scenarios in my head 

Thinking of every possible way I'd hurt them

Even when I knew I did nothing bad

I know how much you long

For them to speak up

Because you're tired of picking the knife

And breaking all the ice 

That has frozen my small river of expectations 

Into oblivion 

I know how it must have felt

When you realised 

That there will be no sun to thaw my river

Because picking the knife will always be your job

Not theirs.

It never was theirs.

To all the words I wish I'd said - 

I'm sorry for not letting you out

It's just that I suck at staring contests;

I am destined to blink and lose

Every single time

Because they, will never, ever blink first.

I want to win, just for once

So I am holding you back.