They say time is precious.
A second gone to waste
is a heavy toll that lingers.
And yet we idly sit and wait
in the slow afternoons,
passing through each other
like secondhand smoke.
Our feet move as we leave our hearts behind.
We look up only to find a pitch black sky.

If I could turn back the hands of time,
I would grab the sun and reach for the moon.
There would be more laughter,
more reasons to strive.
I shouldn’t have closed my eyes,
wishing Mondays were Fridays.
Like stardust, the days passed on.

With these thoughts follow regrets
of the life that used to be.
I try to recall when I had lost track.
The photographs I missed,
the words I didn’t hear.
How much I dreamed of progress,
only to find it pulling me back.

So now I retrace my steps
to the very first chapter
of a story that strayed from its tracks.
But even then I feel bare and distant.
I now see what I couldn’t see.
The mistakes that carved my path,
the flaws that made me who I am.
I had disturbed my present with the past.

They say time is precious
so I must have no regrets.
Exist to live, live to exist.

BY ESTHER KANG
Staff Writer