TEN SECONDS TO TWELVE
If I told you that you only had ten seconds to live, what would your last words be? When it comes down to it, how do you make those important decisions? It’s easy, objectively. “I love you”, “I’m sorry”, “Thank you”. Or a prayer.
I have always wondered why people only turn to religion at times of catastrophe. Like God(s) only exist in rubble and death and sadness, ceasing to exist when you lay in bed with a loved one, or when the sun spills into the window. Is that not God, too? Like, when someone is ill, or dying, or dead: “I’ll keep you in my prayers”. Why wasn’t I in them before? Am I only as important as my griefs? My horrors? Does the world only know sympathy when it is dying? When the world is burning, and we know doom is approaching, will we even remember our prayers? “My God, Something Something…. When Something Something… PLEASE SAVE ME PLEASE, I PROMISE I WAS GOOD AND I BELIEVED IN YOU ALWAYS AND IF YOU LET ME INTO THE AFTERLIFE I PROMISE TO BE GOOD AND NOT SIN.” – As if God(s) only see us when we pray.
We fear death. Why? We fear the end of the world. Why? The end of the world happens every day. Every day. 61 million people died in 2023. How many of them do you think knew they were about to die? What do you think their last words were? See, the apocalypse has already happened. The world ended for every single one of those people, but there was no fire or brimstone or ash rising from hell. Apocalypse takes many forms. It is birthed in our psychological vulnerabilities and illustrated in the mind of the creative, depicted everyday through art and graffiti and screams of desperation.
So, when do we know when to give up? When do we, as humankind, finally declare apocalypse? I mean real apocalypse. Not “state of emergency”, not “economic downturn”, but when can we really, truly, finally admit to ourselves that we messed up? That the world is literally burning, that children are dying and the human race has enslaved itself through greed? Is it when the doomsday clock strikes midnight? Is it only when the fire reaches our own homes, that war decapitates purity and goodness, or when pacificists pick up guns? Or, even then, will we really admit it to ourselves? Or will we ignore it, turning on channel one or five or eight or eleven, because they don’t report the number of deaths, the amount of land scorched, children orphaned?
So many questions, and no answers. Because no one will admit it to themselves that change needs to happen. That we have gone too far, and are on the precipice.
So, what would my last words be?
With ten seconds left on the clock, what would my last words be?
I guess, well, if I had to choose, I’d probably say something like
Beatrice Narkeviciute, 17, London - England ✯ IG: @beatr5ce
“17 year old soul with lots of thoughts and nowhere to put them. Lost somewhere on the tube.”