Your Last Letter

Scouring through my thoughts last night, I stumbled upon a letter you wrote. It is a letter, a forgotten reflection of your mind, on a parchment, lying in a forgotten and forlorn corner of my life. I was excited to see it, but then, I was not entirely happy.

I remember you used to write, long time ago. May be you wrote this to me in one such frenzy. I browsed through the letter, glanced at the scribbles and the overwritten words. It reminded me of your effervescent mind.

Scouring through the maze of your words I tried hard to find some stains of your tears. There had to be a few, but then, was it too late? The whole parchment looked stained, with time, with lost hope. Should I have read it earlier? I was not ready, not ready to know how you despised me while you loved me, or how it halved you to go away.

Stains of tears, yes, remind me of the spotted pillows every morning. The mornings, whose nights bore scars of my refusal, scars of you gnawing at your self-respect. But what could I do? No, I wasn’t tired from a long day at work. No, I had not dissipated my love elsewhere. It was just that, you, with your endowed self, the heavy breaths, and that moment’s love, reminded me of a chronic hatred, of an eternal love lost in the eternity of angst.

I know why you hated me so much, but I just could not accept it. I could not accept that you thought time killed it, that it died a natural death. No! I killed it, brutally, in cold blood, in despair. I saw you choke every day, waiting for me, in hope of a better night and a better morrow. But you knew somewhere that it would not happen; that I would break your hopes and somehow know it and laugh. I did not laugh tough, it cut through me too. I wanted to love you every night, every moment following every time you edged close to me seeking me for yourself.

I read your letter again. You had a few complains which made me smile. It reminded me how you used to complain about my forgetfulness. See! How I forgot to read this letter, how I forgot how close you were to me, how you knew me so well, so well that it frightened me? Today, when I read this letter, I am not frightened anymore, and I do not forget many things. But I regret not forgetting. These memories gushing into my eyes and dribbling down my face aren’t exactly what I wanted to remember.

You left me, with memories, with scars, with regret, and with this letter. I am reading this letter for the first time, but it just doesn’t feel so. This letter is a faceless you, talking to me, smiling back at me with tear laden eyes, a heavy voice and a belief that everything would be fine, every wrong would be undone, and every ineffable wish be lived. What could I have done? I did not know how to make you not believe in me? I did not know how to tell you that your hatred for me had left me cataleptic, rigid and lost.

I wish I could have you back, not forever, but for a brief moment, where I could tell you that I was not worthy of that hatred, that I could love you back, all those deserted nights when you thought I was cold and heartless. But how could I, when I could not revive what I had lost in me… Me!