"Broken Friendship" by Palak Taneja is a poem about the way deep friendships can be lost as people drift apart. The poem was originally written in Hindi. Click here to read this poem in its original form.
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"Broken Friendship
by Palak Taneja
There was someone very close to my heart with whom my friendship eventually broke apart.
We used to spend our days chatting away endlessly;
But then, little by little, that restless eagerness to meet one another simply faded away.
Right up until the first year of college, our bond was truly something special;
In every lecture hall and every canteen, our conversations were the only ones that mattered.
But then, as new friends entered your life,
I slowly began to vanish from your world.
I don't know when exactly our conversations lost their former spark;
We were still together, perhaps—but our interactions were no longer the same.
I know not when our conversations lost their former spark,
We were still together, yet our interactions lacked that familiar warmth...
We, who once used to share every little detail with one another,
Today, hide those very same thoughts deep within our hearts...
There was a time when our day wouldn't even begin without seeing each other,
And now, even the habit of simply asking how the other is doing has faded away...
I still remain standing right there, frozen at that very crossroads,
It is simply that in your world, my place has been lost...
Everyone used to sing the praises of our friendship;
Yet, amidst the allure of new faces, our old circle fell apart.
There were days when we would laugh them away—sometimes for no reason at all;
Today, the entire night passed by just waiting for a single message.
Back then, replies would come back in the blink of an eye;
Now, weeks go by before a response to a message finally arrives.
Do you remember laughing out loud at the smallest things?
And teasing one another just for the sake of it?
In the past, a day felt incomplete without each other;
Now—who knows why—silence itself has become a habit.
I have no complaints, nor any grievances to air;
It was simply that someone I held as my own slowly drifted away, becoming a stranger.
Now, sometimes, I merely smile while looking through our old chats—
As if a beautiful memory has gradually faded into an unfinished tale.
Gazing at old photographs brings the entire story flooding back to me,
And often, amidst the laughter, my eyes grow misty with tears.
There are times I wish that everything could go back to how it used to be,
But some people—even when physically close—can never truly be the same again.
Perhaps you have moved on, forging ahead into your new world;
But I, even today, remain frozen somewhere within the realm of those old memories.
You have perhaps moved forward into your new world,
But I remain, even today, somehow frozen amidst the old memories...
And perhaps this is what is called an unfinished friendship—
Where love still exists, yet the togetherness is gone...
Someone who was very close to my heart—with whom the bond has broken...
Someone who was very close to my heart—with whom the bond has broken...
From the Author
Palak Taneja is a poet who writes predominantly in Hindi. You can find the above story written in the original Hindi here. This poem was translated to English with the help of Google Translate. If you or someone you know can volunteer translation services, please contact Laura Browne-Lambert at contact.undergroundbookshelf@gmail.com. Volunteer translators will be credited and may submit bios or contact information if desired.
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