I can never do the one thing I want the most to do,
I can only - suddenly: fear,
Encroaching shadows.
Blindsided, I wish I could say. But no.
Not quite.
Doubt shrouds my intentions,
Like a cloud blocking out - no, an eclipse,
Predetermined intervals of near complete darkness,
A pattern of uncertainty, a seeming dichotomy-
But reliable nonetheless...
All the same.
Ordered chaos; predictable, unwelcome, regrettable.
Torturous, truly.
Light again, passing by, gone again-
Always.
Never.
I can never do the one thing I want the most to do.
I can only do the one thing I am wont the most to do.
And I am helpless to it all.
Lost to it all.
It is a cruel discrepancy.

A broken shell, a living hell, and all I'm left with now is my regret.

Better days ahead were a pipedream after our relationship crumbled. Countless arguments. Disagreements. Every day! For my life, I can't believe we stayed together as long as we did. God knows I didn't want her to leave me. How much longer must I wrestle with these painful memories?

I just feel regret, unspoken, I just feel the pain; since she left, my life has been a broken shell, a living hell — I can't believe I let her go; it was foolish pride before the fall the day she left when I lost all — I should have held her closer, I should have made her see the feelings I have for her, what she means to me; I didn't say I love her or beg her to stay, instead, I stood in silence and watched her walk away, and all I'm left with now is my regret.

Justification is an exercise in futility. Knowing what I could have and should have done leaves an inextricable switchblade in my soul. Love's lessons learned too late — love's loss too great.

Misting eyes beseech as memories replay in my head, but they're too painful, and I feel dead. No joy to be found. Oh well, my self-imposed hell. Painful memories open like an oubliette under my feet, plunging me lost and languishing in isolation's labyrinth. Questions left unanswered, decaying in the debris fields of "what if.”

Reflection can be a catharsis for the soul, but it can also rip a hole in it, and soon reality roars from guilt's bottomless pit to devour all hope. Sometimes despair is mitigated by occasional reminders of us. Thoughts lingering on happier times, blessed moments mine to treasure. Until the damnable loop of regret dominates to decimate any respite of joy. Vanishing expectations. Weeping willow's silent wail. Xerox memories fade with time.

Years have passed, and my thoughts continue to haunt me over what we could have had. Zero-sum game — all I'm left with now is my regret.




Mark Toney ©️ 2023

*       *       *

April 22, 2023

I hope you found the above fictional prose poem interesting. I wrote it in response to a writing challenge I heard about.  Write a 26-sentence short story (or prose poem). Each sentence must begin with the alphabet's sequential letters starting with A through Z. One sentence must be 100 words long, and another sentence only one word. Would you like to try it?

You have never gone after
what you really wanted.
Sure, at the last moment, you
have desperately leaped out
and tried to grab on to something
as it went by. That doesn’t count;
you never stood a chance,
you never put all of your heart
and soul on the line, to humbly and
doggedly pursue anything at all.

Maybe you’ve never needed
anything, but I think that’s a lie
and you know it. You might say
that you needed it too much,
so much so that even the thought
of failing is too painful to endure.
You froze that feeling out, called it
impractical, unreasonable,
unnecessary. Those were lies
as well. You can hide behind the lies
but they will never feed your soul.

There is something you need.
Something you want down to
the very spark of your being,
something that will fill you up
with the life force of the universe
and set you ablaze to hang
in the heavens, among the stars.

You can continue failing through
inaction, hoping your passion
will atrophy, and it might, but that
inner you, the you that wants so
many things for you, it will atrophy
too, until you are a husk
of a person. There is nothing
sadder than a person who
used to have fire within their soul.

You can choose to smother yourself
or you can choose to go for it,
to coax that spark to flame and feed
the fire until it blazes forward carrying
you along. You can choose.

NCL September 2019

You can get through this
You will if you choose
To focus not on what is
But on all you can do

You found your way in
You can make your way out
But if you don’t take action
You’ll be left there to pout

Not the greatest of statues
Repels the force of a train
It takes a man on the move
Telling the conductor “there, you will stay”

So don’t wait for a hero
Or occasion to fade
For the moment you lie down
Is when your bed becomes made

Actions over words
What are words without fire
Fire that moves and burns the world
Licking the flames of your tragedies
And taking you towards a new forest
Where the pasts have burned
Touch the fertile ground of your new mind
Promote yourself from writer to soldier
Don't you dare take your time
Your next words would be your last
Your next move could be the first of firsts
The builder
The fighter
The mightier
The worthier
Everyone knows that glory is in being alive
The only thing more alive that words
Is your body moving to fulfill the words