Anonymity: A Short Story (Day Five of Seven)

Be sure to read Day One, Day Two, Day Three, and Day Four first!

Day Five

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No progress notes.

I thought of Dante Alighieri, a simple brute in retrospect, seen as a genius because of poetry. If poetry was the mark of a genius, then modern medicine must be contemplated as a miracle.

Nonetheless, I thought of Dante. “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality,” he had said.

But I was not neutral.

I was broken. Was it worth distinguishing the difference? I thought again of my wife. Her features written in dust, slowly blustering away from me. I had to think of freedom.

But does a shattered saucer think of freedom as he is swept into a dust bin? So, why then would I, a husk of who I once was, even allow my eyes to glimmer at the prospect of hope?