The harm will come : it never doesn\u2019t. It will open up our chests and enter here. Some days it will come by for\u00adtune, some days by no agent in par\u00adti\u00adcu\u00adlar, and some\u00adtimes others will bring it to us, either will\u00adful\u00adly or on acci\u00addent. Those others might trip, the harm spilling out of their arms onto us. We might all look at each other start\u00adled. We might all have the harm then and eyes full of tears.<\/p>\n
The others might take one look at us or many looks at us and decide we deserve the harm. We will look back at them with our faces in the forms of ques\u00adtions or curses. We will say : Were my words or how they were arran\u00adged what causes you to bring this to me ? Are you upset with my body ? Do you seek ven\u00adgeance against the way my eyes light up or how my body grows tense at the sun\u00adlight in par\u00adti\u00adcu\u00adlar angles ?<\/em> And How dare you !<\/em> and What where you thinking ?!<\/em><\/p>\n Sometimes the ones who bring the harm will ans\u00adwer, but both their ans\u00adwers and their not ans\u00adwe\u00adring can be methods by which they bring more of the harm.<\/p>\n The harm will take away the hours of the day of lengh\u00adten them. It will drain from us six hun\u00addred and four\u00adteen thou\u00adsand tears. It will force our per\u00adcep\u00adtions to it so that we do not see the moon in the sky or the red\u00addish-yel\u00adlow apple we would other\u00adwise eat, so that even our dreams, if we are lucky enough to have them, go to the harm as if the harm has built tracks on which a train can only go toward the loca\u00adtion of itself but never actual\u00adly arrive.<\/p>\n When our loved ones speak to us, we will not hear them because we will hear ins\u00adtead the sound the harm put in us, which at first is the sound like an alarm set by acci\u00addent that sof\u00adty com\u00adplains of itself, and then it becomes the sound of our own ears cra\u00adshing against the harm, or vice ver\u00adsa, until no other sound is left, and then we can\u2019t remem\u00adber there were ever other sounds at all.<\/p>\n The harm is always com\u00adpoun\u00adding, attrac\u00adting to itself more of itself, and with this pro\u00adli\u00adfe\u00adra\u00adting nature it begins to occlude what is true, right, neces\u00adsa\u00adry, and urgent. The pur\u00adposes for which one lives, and the\u00adre\u00adfore for which one exposes one\u00adself to the harm begin to disap\u00adpear from sight. One is left only with the harm and more of it, and more of it, and more of it, until there is nothing but harm and the harm spaw\u00adned from that. No lon\u00adger being able to see what is true, right urgent, and neces\u00adsa\u00adry, a per\u00adson can no lon\u00adger act on the true and right\u2019s behalf, or even if some sli\u00adver of it remains une\u00adclip\u00adsed, the harm\u2019s pro\u00adli\u00adfe\u00adra\u00adtion can para\u00adlyze any poten\u00adtiel act.<\/p>\n It is per\u00adhaps bet\u00adter to allow one\u00adself to feel the harm than to not feel it, for the harm may also be like an entry in the ency\u00adclo\u00adpe\u00addia of what has not yet been writ\u00adten but what is impor\u00adtant to know. One might find in this entry the genus of the harm and its rela\u00adtion to other harms, might grow secure in a know\u00adledge of harm\u2019s taxo\u00adno\u00admy. One might find there an account of the harm\u2019s com\u00adplex rela\u00adtion to what is true, right, etc. that reveals cru\u00adcial but elu\u00adsive infor\u00adma\u00adtion about what is just and unjust in the com\u00admon world. One might find infor\u00adma\u00adtion on how to act in this fee\u00adling : what alliances to make or decline, what objects to lift with one\u2019s domi\u00adnant hand, what to do with the objects one\u2019s domi\u00adnant hand has lif\u00adted, how to ope\u00adrate in the bit\u00adter sys\u00adtem of the world as it is, whe\u00adther to turn left or sit down or touch hands light\u00adly with a friend and fol\u00adlow contra\u00addic\u00adtions to their ends.<\/p>\n The harm can be stu\u00addied like any\u00adthing, eve\u00adry wept tear a text-book, eve\u00adry minute of shal\u00adlow brea\u00adthing a mono\u00adgraph, seven hours and four\u00adteen minutes of a slee\u00adpless night a tedious-to-read but poten\u00adtial\u00adly use\u00adful dis\u00adser\u00adta\u00adtion on having existed.<\/p>\n It is not as if what is true, right, urgent, and neces\u00adsa\u00adry is a light, and what is harm is the dark\u00adness. They are both dark\u00adnesses : they are both lights.<\/p>\n