The Diary of Jose Rizal

Suicide can sometimes feel like the only way to pacify the pain. It is as if something is eating away parts of you slowly and intently and the only way to relieve the constant pain, is to die. Tiffany Hunter and Pierre L’errant are two very different characters with both equally unique yet queer personalities. Although Pierre and Tiffany are not the best of friends, their contrasting characteristics somehow complement each other. They both have similarities in their plans of suicide as well as differences that help them make the correct decision on where they want their life to go in future. Although they both made different decisions at the end, they assisted each other to settle on the right choice. Drew Hayden Taylor develops a theme of despondency and isolation from peers and loved ones in the novel “The Night Wanderer.”

“Letto diciassette!” I froze at the sound of “bed seventeen,” and watched with horror as the Italian nurse ran into my grandmother’s hospital room. The monitors were beeping out of control, yet my heart seemed to be beating even faster and louder. I stood at the end of the dimly lit hall, shaking and unable to move. A health care provider spotted me standing there, desperate, alone, and vulnerable, and made her way over to comfort me. The feelings I experienced next were what I remember most when I look back on that dark and gloomy day in Italy. ***The feelings of hope, reassurance and genuine kindness. The feeling that a missing piece of my heart had been put back where it belonged. That is what I remember most and that is the role I want

Fear is an amazing emotion, in that it has both psychological as well as physiological effects on the human body. In instances of extreme fear, the mind is able to function in a way that is detached and connected to the event simultaneously. In “Feared Drowned,” Sharon Olds presents, in six brief stanzas, this type of instance. Her sparse use of language, rich with metaphors, similes and dark imagery, belies the horror experienced by the speaker. She closes the poem with a philosophical statement about life and the after-effects that these moments of horror can have on our lives and relationships.

Eaton presents both settings as hostile and daunting. The desert is depicted as being a dangerous prison from which escape is impossible as described as “Dry, thorny bushes formed a natural, almost impenetrable wall of spinifex.” (Pg.145) and Port Barren as described as “A hot, dusty, dry hole with flies.” (Pg.17) by Jamie. The reader is positioned to sympathize with Jamie’s predicament of being stuck in this unfriendly environment. Jamie’s relationship with the setting by the end as he is accepted by the locals and earns a sense of belonging. As a short extract from the story represents: “I meant to ask you, what do you reckon I am? Neither mate. You’re local.” (Pg.

Death is a topic that unites all of humanity. While it can be uncomfortable to think about, confronting death in unavoidable. “Dying” addresses that discomfort and universal unwillingness to consider the inevitability of death. Pinsky’s use of imagery, symbolism, and tone create a poetic experience that is like death, something every reader can relate to. In “Dying,” Pinsky describes how people are oblivious and almost uncaring when it comes to the thought of death. Pinsky is trying to convince the reader that they shouldn’t ignore the concept of death because life is shorter than it seems.

I spent the rest of the summer underneath an ocean of melancholy. Taking to sleeping during the long, burning days, I spent my nights in a wallow of self-despair. My father grew worried, and I will be forever thankful of him for offering to drive me places, just to get out of the house. Nevertheless, I lost contact with most of my friends. I stopped attending any social gatherings.

It was a beautiful, sunny day in Puerto Rico where my family and I were taking a vacation that spring. As I lay on my dad’s colorful bed in the small pink villa on the water, I find it hard to enjoy the view that comes from the balcony and the salty smell of the light blue ocean. The villa resides on a rocky cliff where the rippling ocean waves smash onto the rocks below. The waves, which usually relax me, are insignificant. I see colorful houses that run along the water for miles just like ours. In the corner of my eye I see the infinity pool that looks out onto the crystal clear water. Something else is on my mind. Something not even the alluring scenery could take my mind off of-death. One month earlier, I lost my mom to a vicious disease called cancer. Its evilness left my family and I broken and sick at heart. When I look back now to that vacation, I think nothing other than sadness and mourning. Maybe it was too soon to take a vacation, I thought. My dad walks into his room and sits next to me on his bed.

Each individual has a unique way of coping with death, and this is evident throughout Christina Rossetti’s, “Remember” and W. H. Auden’s “Stop all of the Clocks”.

As people near the time of their deaths, they begin to reflect upon the history and events of their own lives. Both John Keats’ “When I have Fears” and Henry Longfellow’s “Mezzo Cammin” reflect upon the speakers’ fears and thoughts of death. However, the conclusions between these two poems end quite differently. Although both reflect upon Death’s grasp, Keats’ displays an appreciation and subtle satisfaction with the wonders of life, while Longfellow morbidly mourns his past inactions and fears what events the future may bring.

The night air was heavy with silence. Clouds drifted across a calm sky, and a full moon shone in the distance. In a small hut on the outskirts of the valley, an old man lay in bed, awake in the peaceful slumber of the village. His breaths came in rattling gasps, his forehead burned, and his joints felt stiff with pain. He shifted on the blankets, his withered hands clenched in fists as he tried to suppress the wave of bitter memories coming to him. His life had been nothing more than work, loss, tragedy. He remembered all of his hope, his ambition, in his youth, and he smiled bitterly. No one would remember him as the man that he had once hoped he would become. Now, as his breathing became heavier and he felt himself fading on the brink of

There is an underlining theme of death and the fear of death in both Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado” and Dylan Thomas’s “Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night”. Both stories tell a of death and the fears of our mortal lives and what is to come next. Poe’s short story focuses on two characters that are of the same cloth, two Italian men of some stature and class, but one has insulted the other. Fortunato is on the unfortunate recipient of death and is unaware until the very end. Where his so called friend Montresor has tricked him into the dark and scary catacombs where Fortunato will soon be part of all the other remains that are there. Now that Fortunato has learned of his fate,

A morbid melancholy stole over me. Anxiety gnawed at my heart. I was a living corpse. There was a feeling of chill in the air every day as I felt. I faked illness so as not to go to school. Despair hangs heavy in the stifling air. It was a dreary day for me , cold and without sunshine. I dread people and always avoid people. The door was locked from the inside. A cold grey light crept under the curtains. The windows were secured with locks and bars. The room felt cold and sterile.The flowers faded for want of water. A single lamp was suspended from the ceiling. The clock ticked louder and louder in a quiet room. I regarded the room as a refuge from the outside

“In all his travels the Bishop had seen no country like this. From the flat red sea of sand rose great rock mesas... The sandy soil of the plain had a light sprinkling of junipers, and was splotched with masses of blooming rabbit brush,-- that oliver-coloured plant that grows in high waves like a tossing sea, at this season covered with a thatch of bloom, yellow as gorse, or orange like marigolds.” 94 Both women describe the land of desert with such vividness that one is not left with the idea of a barren, sandy soil but an environment that is rich with history as well as life. This life and history of the land are a part of the culture.

I slipped beneath the surface of the pool of grain, my hands sticking straight up over my head as I held my breath, preparing for death. I was preparing for the world to go silent. This was the exact situation my father had warned me about, and I had fallen victim to it despite that. Fourteen years old as of two months ago, and death had already come for me. Or so I thought. I felt firm, callused hands grasp my own, plucking me from my grave. The relief was wonderful. I drank the air in, filling my burning lungs with as much as possible. I almost laughed out of sheer happiness – until my eyes met my father’s.

Death alone is already a confusing subject, which does not become easier to talk about the older we get. But Theodore Finch fantasizes about dying every time he is “awake.” Niven starts the story with Finch