The Tyrant of Time

Nostalgia, a tyrant cloaked in silk,
Threads of memory spun with guilt.
It comes not gently, but with claws,
Scraping at time, defying its laws.

It drags me through hallways of shattered yesterdays,
Where laughter lingers in fractured ways.
Faces appear like ghosts in the mist,
Each smile a dagger, a moment I’ve missed.

What cruelty to mourn what’s already lost,
To relive a warmth that time has embossed.
The arms that held me, the words once spoken,
Now haunt like promises cruelly broken.

It turns the heart into a battlefield,
Where joy and sorrow refuse to yield.
A war of echoes, a ceaseless fight,
Between the day and the endless night.

Why must it taunt, this bittersweet thief,
Offering beauty, then sowing grief?
Its gift is poison, a double-edged blade,
A fleeting solace that starts to fade.

I beg for release, for the mercy of peace,
For time to move on, for the pain to cease.
But nostalgia, relentless, will never depart,
For it lives in the marrow, it beats in the heart.

It is not memory—it is a wound.
A haunting refrain, an unyielding tune.
A cruel god that I never chose,
Binding me forever to what I can’t let go.