Martyr!

by Kaveh Akbar

“Good-person drag,”

“For me, the difference between heaven and hell is not giving a shit about the mess.”

They were the same thing, talking to God and talking to my dead mom.

I mean, I used to piss the bed all the time and try to kill myself. And I don’t piss the bed anymore, at least. So there’s something here, right?

“a God made of words,

Cyrus paused, then said, finally: “I want to die. I think I always have.”

I want my life—my death—to matter more than that.” “You want to be a martyr?”

“That certainty is what put worms in their brains, Cyrus. The only people who speak in certainties are zealots and tyrants.”