reading room
tolerate
tolerate is an ugly word. it chews on itself. it stares through glass and calls it empathy.
accept, though— that one breathes. that one smells of rain and static electricity. it doesn't ask the air for permission.
but— what if the air burns?
I tell myself: be open listen. no, not like that— listen like a scientist dissecting kindness.
in theory, I could discuss the ethics of pain while someone screams. in theory, I could find beauty in the architecture of cruelty.
but theory drips when held too tightly. and the scream becomes a language I cannot mistranslate.
tolerate. the world keeps crawling back. it smells like disinfectant, like a peace treaty written in smog.
I don't want to tolerate. I want to accept the chaos of existing— to bow to difference without bowing to harm.
(you can't, says a voice. you must draw lines.)
so I do. I say: murder is wrong. freedom is sacred. autonomy, non-negotiable. I mean it. and I hate that I mean it with the same fervour I hate the word tolerate.
ethical emotivism— a nice label for a heart that argues with itself.
sometimes I imagine morality as an organ humming in my chest, detuned, self-aware. it keeps playing the wrong note and calling it compassion.
I want to be kind. I want to be right. I want to stop wanting both.
but the truth is— different doesn't need my consent. the world will go on fracturing whether I forgive it or not.
so I practice acceptance, not of all things, but of this: that I am not the centre and still, I burn like one.
— Lilith