“I’m a grenade and at some point I’m going to blow up and I would like to minimize the causalities, okay?
I’m a grenade. I just want to stay away from people and read books and things and be with you guys because there’s nothing I can do about hurting you; you’re too invested, so just please let me do that, okay? I’m not depressed. I don’t need to get out more. And I can’t be a regular teenager, because I’m a grenade.” –from Hazel, The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
These wonderful lines by John Green mean so much to me. I faced my own medical struggles and wrote a poem a few years ago that uses similar symbolism to communicate what it is like living expecting destruction in the future.
Here is my poem, i am a volcano.
they told me
i was a volcano.
they told me
don’t worry
you are dormant
they told me that
they were filled with reason
I was filled with lava
they told me
that eruptions may occur
but cannot be predicted
but that I was dormant
that they would try to keep me dormant
they stormed and shined and rained at me
at me,
the volcano