The Ache of Almosts

I found an old notebook tucked away in a drawer, its pages filled with half-written letters and unfinished plans. Names I almost called, places I almost went, dreams I almost chased. The weight of those almosts hit me like a cold wave—ghosts of what could have been, pressing heavy on my chest.

Almost is the ache of standing at a door, hand raised, and pulling away at the last moment. It’s the sound of footsteps fading before they ever reached you, the glance that didn’t meet your eyes long enough to matter. These almosts aren’t just missed chances—they’re fragments of a life that teased itself into existence but never quite formed.

There’s a peculiar grief in mourning what was never fully real. The almosts live in liminal spaces—between hope and regret, desire and denial. They haunt the edges of memory like shadows that refuse to vanish, reminding us how close we’ve come to something meaningful, yet how far we remain.

What do we do with these echoes? How do we carry the ache without letting it crush the fragile bones of our present? Maybe the ache of almosts is less about loss and more about proof—that we dared, we reached, we almost became.

Because sometimes, the weight of what never happened is heavier than what did.

Comments

A Blank Verse Poetry

I ran this morning. Gray sky, nothing special. Weather that doesn’t force you to feel anything. Usually, I wander without purpose. Today, something stopped me. Time is a trap. We pretend it’s limited, but it isn’t. So we rush through it—steps, choices, life—until it all blurs. The small things disappear. The smell of earth, the quiet air. Gone. A song got stuck in my head. “I’ll stop the world and melt with you.” Unwanted. Persistent. How did it get in? Maybe fate. Maybe nothing. I don’t believe in destiny, but here I was—stuck in the sound, stuck in a loop. The world paused inside me. I didn’t move. The day went on. Hands trembled—not from connection, but from the weight of existing. Scars on skin—maps of past failures. Nothing clean, nothing clear. I touched a cheek. No softness. Smoke? Habit? Grip loosened—like sanity slipping. Wanting to let go, but afraid of the emptiness that follows. I kissed a cheek. A stupid move. A laugh broke the silence. A glitch. A mistake. Coffee a...

The Slow Death of the Familiar Lie

The 2025 elections just ended. Not with fireworks, not with riots—just the quiet unraveling of yet another chapter in our nation’s long and complicated dance with democracy. There’s something different in the air this time. Something subtle, like the way dusk falls before you even realize the day is gone. You feel it before you name it: a shift. Not seismic, perhaps not even visible to the untrained eye. But there, like a whisper at the edge of a crowded room. People have grown wiser. And no, this isn’t naive optimism. It’s not the kind of blind faith that wears campaign colors and chants slogans. It’s the kind of wisdom that comes from repeated heartbreak—from choosing hope too many times, only to be betrayed by men in suits and smiles. From believing in change only to see it morph into the same old trapo politics dressed in newer fonts. “Pain is a brutal but effective teacher—especially in a country where memory is often the first casualty of every election cycle.” But maybe ...

Stars and Songs

It’s 2 am and I am still awake. Though I had a long nap this afternoon, for some reason, my stubborn brain suddenly erupts in these manic streaks. My mind suddenly reboots itself and in a couple of minutes, I become as hyper as a kid who just ate 27 chocolate bars. Since it’s pointless to lie down and struggle to find the best position, I took my laptop, go out at the porch and started writing. As sat there, I looked at the heavens and there shines my moon together with the stars. The sky was barren of clouds and you can perfectly see how the earth is blanketed by the dark sky as the moon and the stars gave it an enchanting touch. The moon’s light is waning, so are my thoughts. I guess I am lunatic as I can write lots whenever the moon goes full. I consider the moon as my muse so I wondered, Why can't I shift my obsession to the stars? I think this is quite improbable. Stars are illusions, I mean, most of the time, the light that we see from these stars are actually t...

Fragments of the Quiet Mind

Search This Blog