The Grokking Fig

—

Mandy Hale

humans are fucking terrible and this awful world we live in will fucking kill you but if you are kind, if you are brave and clever and try really hard, you can defy it. you can impose on this bleak and monstrous structure something beautiful. even if it’s temporary. even if it doesn’t heal anything inside you that’s been hurt.  

it just requires that you be kind. viciously. vengefully. you fight back. you plant flowers. give to charity. play games. pet someone’s dog. scream into the dark. paint and write and dance, tell jokes, sing songs, bake cookies. you have been hurt and you don’t have to deny that hurt. you just have to recognize it in other people, and take their hand, and say: no more. enough. fuck this. no more. 

have a cookie.

2. A good quote: There are two kinds of people. Those who think, “I don’t want anyone to suffer like I did.” And those who think, “I suffered; why shouldn’t they?”

3. Two good quotes by Kurt Vonnegut: “Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It’s hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It’s round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you’ve got a hundred years here. There’s only one rule that I know of, babies-“God damn it, you’ve got to be kind.”

Simple hues,

Unprepared for complexity.

But oh god,

I turn red when you look at me

And I catch your eyes lingering longer than you’d like to admit.

As if you’re a wanderlust traveller discovering borderlines

I turn red

When your finger tips

start to imitate this ocean of sheets;

curling around me and pulling me underneath

I turn red

When your lips trail embers onto my skin

And light me up like I’m the burning end

Of all your cigarettes

But do you inhale me the same way?

Darling, do I live in your lungs longer than a few seconds

Or do you just like seeing the color red?”

She insists that he is well cared for and is confused as too why he never has changed from looking so sickly and weak despite her best efforts.

This is what Death sent after you, for taking so many people away from them. You knew that Death wasn’t pleased by your actions, but you didn’t think he’d go that far.

You know that this ‘disease’ is not a disease, it’s a trap, made just for you. So that you will finally stop healing people who are supposed to die.

“Can you- Can you help him?”, the mother asks.

You look at the boy, who seems to already be half dead. “Do you want to live?”, you ask, knowing very well, that he knows that he’s drawn to death.

“I don’t want you to die”, he whispers, because he’s too weak to talk normally.

“That was not the question.”

The little boy looks up to his mother and nods.

“Okay”, you say, reaching out to him and taking his hand.

Your hand burns like you’re touching hot lava and you feel how your body gets weaker and weaker.

This will be the last one you can save. You can hear how Death is already walking towards you, as your sight goes black. They’re singing a cute melody, similiar to a song you sing to kids to make them fall asleep.

Your body is now completely numb, you can’t even feel the ground under your feet.

As brothers are they joinēd heart to heart;

But Cupid hath not struck them with his bow;