The world cries out in anguish

by Monica Heiss

Honorable Mention, Prose, Create | Encounter 2025

The world cries out in anguish. Does anybody hear it?

The night is silent as I scroll through social media watching random videos. Bored, I keep swiping up, until an image of gore fills my screen. "A victim of abortion" the caption reads. Disturbed, I block the account that shared it and keep scrolling.

The morning is cold. I stir my coffee and make my breakfast. The image from last night flashes through my mind. My stomach roils as I stare hard at the strawberry jam on my bagel. "Just forget about it", I tell myself. "The image was probably fake. Abortion isn’t like that.” I stamp down my unease and go on with my day, forgetting the image.

I sit at my desk at work. My coworkers gossip in hushed whispers in the cubby beside me. I try to ignore them, but a few words catch my attention. "The governor signed his death warrant today." I pause my typing and listen, but their words become indistinguishable. I frown, picking up my phone. It doesn’t take long to find the death warrant, signed this morning. Curious, I search the inmate's name, and a petition loads at the top of the results. I never thought of the death penalty before, I didn’t realize it was still legal, or that people were so against it. My stomach flips seeing the man's face, who is to be killed in a few short hours. I close the tab and shake out my hands, resuming my work. "He must’ve done something really bad", I tell myself. "It’s to keep us safe". I go home and try to forget about him, but I see the man's face in my dreams.

"I have cancer", my neighbor says. "My doctor gave me this pamphlet and said it was my best option". Eyebrows knit together, I take the paper from her. "The mercy of assisted suicide" it reads. My neighbor has tears in her eyes. "I don’t want to die."

In my room, the lights are off. I lay on my bed holding a pillow to my chest, it’s wet with tears and stained with mascara. "I don’t want to die". Her words echo around my head, settling into my soul. “She is a human being,” I think. “She doesn’t deserve this.” The face of the man on death row emerges from the shadows where I placed him. The abortion victim does, too. "I didn’t want to die", they whisper. I sit up and wipe my tears away, reaching for my laptop. I search the name of the man that had been imprinted on my heart and find the petition. The link leads me to the organization that made it, where I find more petitions, more people on death row, more warrants. "These are human beings", I think. "They’ve been in prison for twenty years, they’re not a threat. Why are they being killed?" No answer I find feels justified.

Curiosity gets the better of me. I search for the abortion victim image next. It doesn’t take long to find the account that shared it on my block list. More images flood the screen. 7 weeks, 16 weeks, 28 weeks. An arm here, part of a face there. Little hands and feet, torn and bloodied. I don’t look away. I don’t think I can. "These are human beings", I sob.

The world cries out in anguish. I finally hear it.

I follow more organizations online and mourn the people they post about. I spend my free time poring over research. Embryology, capital punishment, euthanasia. I go to appointments with my neighbor, I fight for her right to real medical care. I volunteer at the crisis pregnancy center down the street. I attend vigils for those whose lives are in the hands of the state, I weep with others as they’re crushed in the fists of revenge and unforgiveness.

In anguish, we cry out at the multitude of injustices I spent so long ignoring. And we are heard.