Key M

“What I want to say is that I was happy. Not always, not even mostly. But I did know real, deep joy. Maybe everyone gets a certain amount to use up over a lifetime, and I just used my lifetime’s allotment especially quickly, with Leila. But I don’t think it was a tragedy, my life. Tragedies are relentless. Nobody could ask for more than what I’ve had.”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“He wanted, acutely in that moment, to be not-alive. Not to be dead, not to kill himself, but to have the burden of living lifted from his shoulders.”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!