The soil’s richAs black and dank as it gets in these partsIt’s the digging that’s getting medownIt’s that feeling, you knowWhen your arms acheAnd you’re wiping your forehead So thick the dripping sweat It’s blinding me, you thinkIt’s blinding me and so even if I find the thingI won’t see it I won’t recognize itBecause the two are different you knowIt’s why the ants don’t scatter at the sight of usWe’re too bigWe’re right there in front of themBut that’s not always enoughWell it’s like that, I’m telling youI’ve been hereAll dayFor monthsYears nowMy whole damn lifeAnd I’m telling you There’s no bottom to this thingIt’s a mistake Thinking you’re emptying out to an endLook aroundLook aroundIf death was the answerWe’d have stopped looking a long time ago

Welcome to The ALIVE hour.

Illustration: Shannon ColonFeaturing Robyn Riley + Chloe Riley. Music: Chloe Riley

Things found in real life

* Your letters / other ways of interacting which look like this:

* And this:

* And this:

* And this:

* And this:

* And this:

Things found on the internet

* This section from this profile of writer Lois Lowry. (She’s talking about the death of her son, how it stays with her still):

When he died, a friend of mine who was a Shakespearean actor sent me a quotation from “Macbeth.” In the play, Macduff gets the news that his wife and children have been killed, and he becomes inconsolable and incoherent. Another character says to him, “Give sorrow words. The grief that does not speak whispers the o’er-fraught heart and bids it break.” And I think that’s true. I think it’s something that literature does, that writing does, that speaking about things does. It keeps our hearts from breaking.

* This thought on letter-writing from writer Jami Attenberg:

Sadly, e-mail has triggered the decline of the handwritten note; I have seen its near-disappearance in my lifetime. I do not mourn the death of the printed letter in a snobby, East Coast, patrician way—“Where have our manners gone?”—but because I love objects, I love paper, and I love something that I can hold to my chest for a moment.

* This quote from Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who passed away Dec. 26 at the age of 90:

All I long for is a society that would be compassionate. A society that would be sharing. A society that would be caring. Now you can say to me, and I will admit it, that we have not seen an incarnation of that kind of society, the kind that you talk about. But we are ministers, we leave it to others to try to put flesh onto the dreams that we try to dream . . .

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit thealivehour.substack.com