How do you mend a broken heart?

How often do you actually realise that you have broken a heart? How do you cope with the knowledge that every word you spoke was making an incision, every action of yours was sawing away on an innocent heart? How do you cope with the fact that you could be so heartless? How do you get out of the lousy feeling, which makes your stomach churn its guts out?

For the first time in life, I made an other heart bleed, and I cringe at it, more so because of the fact that nothing in my power....nothing I say, nothing I do, will make it up to her. For the first time in life, I was so myopic to my own actions, never saw where it was going. For the first time in life, I want to say all the SORRY I can, even though it will not make an iota of difference to the damage done.

For the first time in life, I have been guilty of nurturing an undefinable relationship, and bringing it down in the worst possible manner, of extending hands to build castles in her heart, and then demolishing them with the same ones. For the first time in life, I am ready to do anything to make her feel better, to help her get over the trauma, but I'm tied down with the helplessness that I was the one who made her go through this in the first place.

For the first time in life, I hate myself. I hate myself for having broken a heart, for having made her cry, for having given reason for her to drift away, for throwing away the crystal I had in my hands, for watching it break it to a hundred pieces, for the knowledge that nothing I do can put it up the way it was before, for gashing an existing wound, for bringing back the pain, for giving wings to a placid heart and bringing it down when it started to fly.

I just wanted to be someone she can say she shares so much in common with. I just wanted to be nice, to care for her as a good friend, to be around for her, to hear her agony, to provide her a shoulder to cry on, to share her joys, to listen to her laugh, to console her in her sorrow, to wipe her tears away, you know, just to be the thing good friends are made of.

But, now I know I can't. Because now the sorrow has been caused by me, the tears flow because of me, and I only want that one chance. To wipe away the tears which flowed on account of me, to make her laugh away the sorrow which I caused her. I want her to talk to me, about all those things which we have put off for another day. I want her to know, that I dont want to lose her, what with all the things we have in common. We came up with something in common, even the last time I spoke to her.

I want her to know that I will be there for her, even though it is highly unlikely that she will ever ask me anything consciously. I want her to know that my utter thoughtlessness was not intentional. I want her to know that the lines were not blurred deliberately. It was only that there was a difference in where we drew the lines. I kept my line in sight, and was totally unaware that my feet were stomping, making undefinable patterns, on what was left of hers. And when I backed off, it was too late. My eyes, which were so mindful of my line, could only see the blurred remains of footprints: awry, trodden, shambled, irreparable. I want to redraw those lines, but this time, the two will be together. I just want her to give me another chance, as she said she would.

I have fallen in my own eyes, and there is nothing that makes a man more ashamed. She may forgive me, after her wounds have healed, but it will be a long time before I can get this lousy feeling out of my gut, before I can look myself in the eye.