Matthew Mong

English 12 Mini
To text, or not to text
To text, or not to text? That is the question
Whether tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The anxiety and panic of waiting for her message,
Or to take arms against a wave of anxiety,
And, by opposing, message her first? To type, to hit enter
No moreand by a single word to say we start
The heartache and the thousand introductions lacking valor
That flesh is heir totis a consummation
Devoutly to be wished! To talk, to chat.
To chat, perchance to meetay, theres the rub,
For in that first conversation what scenarios may arise
When we have but mere minutes to impress,
Must give us pause. Theres the respect
That makes one stare at this screen.
For who would bear the whips and scorns of loneliness,
The seen with nay a response, the number yond isnt actually hers,
The pangs of despised love, the batterys drain,
The insolence of your wingman, and the spurns
That the bumbling and witless bachelor takes,
When he himself might avoid his debacle
With a simple power off? Who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary existence,
But that the dread of life full of loneliness,
The mad game of courtship, whose rules incomprehensible,
Few travelers master, puzzles the mind.
And makes us rather bear the single life we have
Than fly into a relationship that we know not of?
Thus the pursuit of love doth make cowards of us all,
And thus man must remain in heated debate
Choosing between passive and aggressive
And enterprises of great hope and desire
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose thy name of action.Soft you now,
Thy first messagebrothers, in thy orisons
Wish me godspeed and fortune

The quarter spins on the cluttered table before him. Between the gloom of dusk and
the haze of dust its hard to see anything past the tiny eating space. Hes done this hundreds
of times, and yet today he sits rigid, watching with rapture. Today the sides of the coin mock
him endlessly. The face on the coin spits venom into his ears: it speaks of the pain he has
endured, the fighting, the running, the crying. The coin slows. There is no point to this
existence if it will continue like this, it would be so much better to end himself now. The sleep
would be peaceful, he could feel it, the everlasting nothingness would be a welcome friend in
this broken world of fear and anger. But the coin keeps spinning, and now the opposite side
taunts him, death is not the end, it is the unknown. The coin teeters, his heart skips a beat.
For all he knows it could be a darker black than the night of pain he already lives in. The
mocking continues, he is no hero. The voice tells him to run, to escape the pain, but if he
isnt even capable of living theres no way he would have the courage to end his life with a
killing. How could he be worthy of death if he isnt capable of living. The coin falls. The words
in his head slither away as he looks at the piece of metal. Today he lives, tomorrow is up to
fate.