A Letter to Regret
Dear regret,
You are the keeper of every
Disappointment in my life,
Of all the times I wish that I
Had stopped to think first and
Carpe Diem wasn’t my motto.
You fill my day with echoes
Of my many missteps and mistakes.
You keep me sitting up at night,
Wondering what I could have done.
You leave my brain on repeat.
Oh, if only! Your insidious whisper
Slithers through my thoughts,
Poisoning any happy moment
With previous foolishness. You
Keep me immobile, frozen in fear.
Past memories haunt me;
Events I cannot hope to change.
Now I finish arguments with the air--
I should have said this, or that!--
You let me win; I am never wrong.
If I’m lucky, I’ll make most mistakes
While I’m young and headstrong,
And the rest of my life will simply
Fall into place. Eventually, my
Fear will have no power over me.
You have no place here. You only
Corrupt the most beautiful dreams.
You make me wary, when I should
Be ready to take on whatever comes.
Mistakes are how I learn, after all.
With one foot planted in the past,
I can never step forward.