Pardon Me, If You Please Poem by ashok jadhav

(A figure pauses at the edge of the light, head slightly bowed, voice soft but charged.)

Pardon me, if you please—
I say it gently,
like an apology wrapped in velvet.
Because that is how I was taught
to enter rooms,
to enter lives.
Pardon me,
for speaking when silence was expected.
Pardon me,
for thinking my thoughts mattered.
I have learned to shrink my words,
to step aside from my own presence.
"Pardon me if you please, "
I whisper while interrupting my own dreams,
while excusing myself
from desires deemed too loud.
Do you hear how often I apologize
for existing?
I beg forgiveness
before I take space,
before I ask,
before I become.
Yet inside me,
there is a voice growing impatient—
tired of bowing,
tired of permission.
Pardon me—
but I am done being invisible.
Done mistaking politeness
for worth.
So yes,
pardon me if you please,
for standing tall,
for speaking clearly,
for no longer apologizing
for my own voice.
This time,
I am not asking to pass by.
I am arriving.