Regrets

I consider regrets. What if? Why did I? Why didn’t I? I guess everyone has these thoughts, though how much time we dally probably determines if there are actual regrets or simply musings. I have recognized the past is in the past and my energy is not well spent there, and typically I give little attention to it. But every now and then, some little reminder floats in front of me, in the guise of a scent, a tune, a dream, and it stirs up the sediment from the bottom of the well and I find myself going over the details of something that happened long ago, and how it might have brought me to another place had circumstances and/or my choices been different. I think it’s part of my human design that makes me vulnerable to melancholic moments.

How ‘bout you? Have you been able to leave the past behind? Or are you a reluctant visitor too, curious about where another path may have lead you? My regrets have no power over me, for I accept where I have landed, and perhaps if I used bricks instead of stones to build my life, I’d have discovered the window placement would have been altered. And I’m happy enough with my view! Anyway, to salve my wounds of the past like the cat who licks his paw, I sometimes ruminate, but this time I turned it into a poem, so I can release my regrets on this page and let them go once and for all.

That thing I did 40 years ago…

All these years later,

Time is a thief, and

My mind is a tiger’s jaw with the steak

I could’ve

I should’ve 

I might’ve

What if

Or how

And why

I, the one who observes,

I am captive to my mind,

Pinned by the eye of the tiger.