Unlearning the Haunted Hellos

I have said so many goodbyes, my soul forgot the dawn,
Each parting etched like frost upon the rose’s velvet lawn.
The echoes trail where warmth once dared to glow—
Now every knock feels like a storm in wait,
A door unopened guards a twist of fate,
And I recoil from even soft hellos.

Adieus were hymns I learned too well to sing,
In silence now, I crown each word with doubt.
What once was bloom now blossoms dread instead,
And joy, if born, comes trembling on a string.
I flinch not at the end, but at its prologue’s ring.
For greetings are where grief begins its route.

So if you smile, and speak my name anew,
Tread lightly through the corridors I feign—
For every welcome stirs a phantom’s pain,
A ghost of what the last embrace withdrew.
I do not fear the cold; I dread the dew—
The promise in the morning that ends in rain.

I’m learning now what hearts aren’t meant to know:

How not to answer haunted hellos.

-Ramisha Jain

13.04.2025

This poem is based on the saying, "I have said so many goodbyes that now I fear saying a hello".