2025 Barrett Winner
5th Place Furqan Hassan
“English is a miraculous language, isn’t it?”
He observed her countenance as if he laid out a riddle:
“Why—how?”
She remarked on his enthusiasm with anticipation of another satire or a lame joke,
“How ‘love’ is utmost similar to ‘live,’ yet different.”
Caught between curiosity and skepticism, almost as though she’s aware of how abstract it all sounds but still intrigued by the possibly deeper point he’s trying to make,
She captures the solemn, which was impalpable in that space before his last utterance.
“As if... as if to love is to live but more!” he almost squeaks.
He palms his own face on the verge of shouting, “Eureka!”
His expressed thoughts though profound are cascaded by his passion