Title: The One I Never Had Poem by ashok jadhav

(The speaker stands alone, voice trembling at first, eyes fixed on an imaginary figure or distant memory. Their hands clutch their chest, as if trying to hold onto a heart that has slipped away.)
Monologue:
I loved you.
God, I loved you.
Every glance, every laugh, every careless word you spoke…
I carried them all inside me, as if they were treasures I could never show.
And you… you never saw me.
Never truly saw me.
You smiled, you laughed, you lived…
and I was nothing but a shadow at the edges of your world.
Do you know what it is to love someone so completely
that their happiness becomes your own breath…
and yet… it will never include you?
It is a fire that warms you and burns you at the same time.
A joy that suffocates.
A longing that refuses to die.
I replay every word I said, every word I didn't say…
searching for a hint, a chance, a mistake I could undo…
But there is nothing.
Nothing but emptiness.
Nothing but this quiet ache that will not leave me.
And still… still I cannot stop.
Cannot let go. Cannot stop loving what I cannot have.
It is madness. I know it is madness.
But love… true love… is never reasonable.
And I… I am hopelessly, endlessly, helplessly yours…
even if you will never be mine.
(The speaker collapses slightly, eyes wet, hands trembling as if holding the ghost of the love they cannot possess.)