A Diary of Longing

By Roshan Tara

The spaces are empty,

cracks opened wide,

silent hollows locked in pain

unspoken, unheard words drift back to me,

explained only in these sad whispers

that find no listener but my own shadow.

My heart echoes

in the hollow of your absence;

your shadow lingers

where my soul still seeks you.

I ache for the warmth of your nearness,

the gentle anchor of your voice

that once tied me to the earth.

I am reminded of your presence

day in and day out,

dusk until dawn

yet your long-awaited absence

forever haunts the marrow of my soul.

And though I’ve always been bad at maths,

I count the seconds, restless and raw,

till our paths might collide again.

Each tick of the clock

is another wound that will not close.

My soul waits, aching still,

for the return of your presence,

while I sit captive among memories:

years bound and sealed

within the cold depths

of the four walls in my mind.

Days turn into weeks,

weeks into months,

months into years…

and year after year,

the hollow carved in my heart

still glows warm

with the embers of your presence once lived.

Each breath I draw

is scented with you;

every taste recalls

the sweetness of your lips.

My hands reach forward,

but there are no hands to hold

only silence greets me,

and my heart cries your name

into a world deaf to longing.

Memories of you loop endlessly

each replay spills the same emotions,

yet with every surge,

I feel both everything and nothing,

a storm that leaves me strangely empty,

like a sea that keeps returning to shore

but never rests.

Perhaps it is a sight of you I live for,

a single glimpse to soothe the ache inside

a diary that writes itself nightly

in ink made of tears and desire,

a testament to a love

that dares not fade.

And so I write,

line after line,

hoping that somewhere,

somehow,

you feel this ache across the distance

that you know

you were, and are,

the unwritten ending of every sentence,

the unwaking dream,

the name my heart will never stop whispering.

By Roshan Tara