Tara

“Often in my life, in the throes of despair, of my husband's abuse, I have held the certainty of the damned, that sense of "everything is going to be just this, this misery forever, till I die." An irrepressible inescapable horror stretching out infinitely in every direction. Tragic, that only terror feels that way.”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“Maybe you'll find your real ending once you stop looking for it. I think real endings tend to work their way in from the outside”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“If the moral sin of suicide is greed, to hoard stillness and calm for yourself while dispersing your riotous internal pain among all those who survive you, then the mortal sin of the martyr must be pride, the vanity, the hubris to believe not only that your death could mean more than your living, but that your death could mean more than death itself — which, because it is inevitable, means nothing”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!

“Cyrus, for months, every song I've listened to has been directly about me. About my life. And my stupid fucking life with you. Every flower has been blooming straight into my fucking face. Do you know what that is? It's like being insane. Like the fucking pigeons are speaking to me. Have you ever felt that? Do you have any idea what I'm even talking about?”
― Kaveh Akbar, Martyr!