When thou art above measure angry, bethink thee how momentary is

Title: The Hourglass Beneath the Flame

Host: The night hung heavy over the city, its sky a bruise-colored canvas streaked with the faint glow of distant lightning. Inside an abandoned train station, the air was thick with dust and echoes. A single lamp, flickering like a dying star, cast long trembling shadows across the cracked tiles.

Jack sat on the edge of an iron bench, his coat collar turned up against the chill, hands clasped, jaw tight. His grey eyes stared at the floor, like a man watching time dissolve through the cracks.

Jeeny stood by the broken window, her hair moving gently in the wind, her eyes following the flicker of the lamp as if reading the language of flames.

A faint rumble of thunder filled the distance, and then — silence.

Jeeny: “Marcus Aurelius once said — ‘When thou art above measure angry, bethink thee how momentary is man’s life.’ Do you ever think about that, Jack? How brief it all is?”

Jack: (with a low laugh) “I think about it all the time, Jeeny. That’s precisely why anger makes sense. When everything’s temporary, you fight harder for what’s yours. You don’t waste time pretending the world is fair.”

Host: A faint gust of wind stirred the papers on the ground, like memories that refused to stay buried.

Jeeny: “So you believe anger is a kind of purpose?”

Jack: “It’s a kind of truth. The only honest emotion left. People use anger to tear through lies. To survive.”

Jeeny: “And yet it tears us apart too. Every war, every betrayal — it begins with anger that forgot how short life really is.”

Host: The lamp sputtered again, casting flickers across Jeeny’s face. There was sadness in her eyes, but also a quiet fire — the kind that could melt iron.

Jack: “You talk like life’s some sacred miracle. But tell me, what does remembering its brevity change? People still hurt each other. They still chase power, revenge, money. Look at history — the French Revolution, the Civil Wars, even now — anger built those empires of change.”

Jeeny: “But at what cost, Jack? Do you remember how the revolutionaries ended up devouring their own? Robespierre began with virtue and ended with blood. Their anger didn’t make them free — it made them blind.”

Jack: “Blindness isn’t in the anger. It’s in the control. Those who pretend they’re calm while plotting quietly — they’re the real monsters.”

Jeeny: “No. The monster is the one who forgets we all fade. When you realize life’s a moment, you can’t hold rage without shame. What’s the point of hating in a life shorter than a sigh?”

Host: A pause settled between them. The rain began to fall, slow and deliberate, against the glass, like time marking its passage.

Jack: (softly) “You think I haven’t tried to let go? I’ve burned through years trying to smother the fire. But every time I see injustice, every time I see lies win — the anger comes back. Like a heartbeat. You can’t reason with that.”

Jeeny: “You can’t, maybe. But you can understand it. You can transform it. Look at Mandela — twenty-seven years in prison, and he walked out without hatred. He remembered what Marcus meant — that life is too brief to be consumed by vengeance.”

Jack: “Mandela was a saint. The rest of us aren’t built that way.”

Jeeny: “No, Jack. He was human. That’s what makes it beautiful. He had the same fire — he just turned it toward light instead of smoke.”

Host: The lamp steadied, its flame no longer trembling. The station filled with a quiet glow, wrapping their faces in half-light, like a painter’s final brushstroke of truth.

Jack: “You talk like forgiveness is some kind of salvation. But tell me, Jeeny, when someone takes everything from you — your trust, your peace — what’s left but anger?”

Jeeny: “You. You’re left. That’s what people forget. The power to remain human in spite of the wound.”

Jack: (leans forward) “And what if remaining human means suffering endlessly? What if peace is just numbness disguised as virtue?”

Jeeny: “Then maybe we must suffer — but without letting the suffering define us. That’s what Marcus tried to say. To bethink — to remember — that our time is a whisper. You don’t waste a whisper screaming.”

Host: The thunder rolled again, closer now, as though the sky itself were arguing. Jeeny’s voice quivered but did not break. Jack’s eyes darkened, like steel cooling after a forge.

Jack: “You think I don’t know how brief life is? I watch it die every day — in faces, in news, in children who grow up learning fear before language. You want me to look at that and feel peace?”

Jeeny: “No. I want you to feel love. Even in anger. Because love is the only force that outlives time. Anger dies with you. Love echoes.”

Jack: “That sounds poetic. But poetry doesn’t rebuild what’s broken.”

Jeeny: “Neither does rage. It only multiplies the ruins.”

Host: The rain grew harder, drumming against the roof, washing the dust from the windows. For a moment, the light reflected on the puddles, shimmering like fragments of forgotten stars.

Jack: (quietly) “You always believe there’s redemption somewhere, don’t you?”

Jeeny: “Yes. Even in you.”

Jack: “Then you’re a fool.”

Jeeny: “Maybe. But fools are often the only ones who still see the horizon.”

Host: Jeeny took a step toward him. Her boots splashed softly in a small pool of water. Jack’s hands trembled, not from cold — but from the collision of rage and remembrance.

Jeeny: “Tell me, Jack. If you had one more day to live — would you spend it angry?”

Jack: (after a long silence) “Maybe not. Maybe I’d just… watch the rain. Maybe I’d try to forgive one thing.”

Jeeny: “Then start now. Because this might be the day.”

Host: Her words hung in the air — fragile, shimmering, infinite. Jack’s eyes lifted, meeting hers. The storm outside softened, as if the world itself paused to listen.

Jack: “You win, Jeeny. Or maybe Marcus does. But don’t ask me to stop feeling it. The anger — it’s all I have to remind me I still care.”

Jeeny: “Then keep it. But hold it like a candle, not a torch. Let it light your way — not burn your hands.”

Host: The lamp flickered once more, then steadied. The sound of the rain became gentle, rhythmic — like a heartbeat slowing down. Jack exhaled, a deep, weary breath, his shoulders sinking.

Jeeny stepped closer and placed her hand on his.

Jeeny: “Do you see it now? How short it all is? How every second you spend hating — steals one more from your only lifetime?”

Jack: “Yeah.” (a faint smile) “I see it. Life’s too short for anger — but too long to live without it entirely.”

Jeeny: “Then maybe the truth lies in balance. To feel it, but not feed it.”

Host: They stood in silence, two souls framed by the sound of rain, the lamp’s glow bathing them in muted gold. Beyond the window, the storm had thinned into a mist, the city lights winking like distant fires of understanding.

Jack looked toward the dark horizon, where the first streak of dawn began to bleed through the clouds.

Host: And as the light grew, something in the air shifted — the anger, the grief, the time — all folded into the same fragile truth Marcus had whispered across centuries:

That life, in all its flame and fury, lasts only the span of a heartbeat — and to waste even one on hate is to forget that we are already fading.

The lamp finally went out.

But their faces, caught in the rising sun, were soft, still, and — for one brief moment — utterly at peace.