Through the Eyes of Sisyphus

Sisyphus’s knees buckle under the weight of the boulder balanced between his palms. His feet sink into the earth, welcomed by pebbles which tear through his calloused skin. He ascends with each step, only for the boulder to fall and for him to chase it. 

***

A group of students raise their picket signs. They are from this city, many dressed in red and yellow bandanas. They march through the streets, collecting scorn and little praise.

“Go back to the countryside,” a storekeeper says. He does not know they live only a few blocks away. 

“We need jobs,” they cry. “We demand a world for the people.”

Eventually, they are detained. Just as other protesters have been. Just as other protesters will be. 

***

To what extent does Sisyphus owe the boulder a responsibility? The boulder does not care. It is made of the earth, inorganic and indifferent. The boulder would rather rest on the ground, obeying gravity’s laws rather than resist them. What pleasure does Sisyphus derive from pushing the boulder against gravity’s jurisdiction? None. Yet he pushes in the hopes that there's something better.

***

A mother jabs her finger into her daughter’s forehead after learning that she had joined an activist organization at her secondary school. Her daughter, taken aback, avoids her mother's gaze. The mother slumps back in her chair, ruffling her hair violently with the vigor of a typhoon.

“Are you serious?” The mother asks in disbelief. “Are you insane?”

Her daughter shrugs.

“Maybe I am," her daughter says. "But maybe that's what people need. Maybe this will lead to something better.”

The mother clenches her fists under the table, her fingers wrapped so tightly inwards her nails dig through skin.

“I don’t want you protesting,” she growls slowly, each word a separate warning. "Not today, Not ever."

Her daughter recoils by slamming the table, staring her mother down.

“Why not?”

“Those student groups are dangerous. I’ve heard they’re being led by far-left militarists. I don’t want them brainwashing you.”

Her daughter doesn’t blink. 

“That's not true!" Her daughter thinks for a second. "And it wouldn't matter if it was. Something needs to change. That's all I want. That's all we're asking for.”

The mother's patience boils into anger. She is offended that her daughter says "we" exclusively. She is offended that her daughter would choose to side with protesters instead of her mother. She is offended her daughter wants change. Everything is fine. Nothing needs to change.

“Do not question my authority,” the mother whispers. Somewhere in her mind she believes she cares about her daughter's safety, but she is controlled by rage.

The daughter squints carefully into her mother's eyes. Contempt blossoms like weeds on both their faces.

“Just as you fail to question your government’s?”

Everything is fine.

Right?

***

The Gods knew he would never be able to push the boulder up completely, but they gave him this task and this task alone. Sisyphus has no choice: he is a man, they are the Gods. 

***

“Due to recent developments across this country, from insurrections in the south, to the bombing in our capital city, I declare, for our nation’s security, proclamation no. 1068, whereby I institute martial law.”

The man’s face flickers on the television. The static betrays his conviction. His voice booms louder than the gunshots outside.

“In the following hours, all press releases will come from, and only from, the government. The laws of our nation will be temporarily suspended during this time of unrest.”

Nervous whispers gather around the television box. 

"A curfew will be instituted from 12 am to 4 pm. Those that break curfew will be detained.”

The man, dressed in white, looks unfazed, untarnished. The people watching wonder if he cares.

“Rest assured, we will stop these radicals from destroying this country.”

Some are afraid of the protests. Others afraid of the backlash. Too many are afraid of change.

***

Sisyphus imagines if at one point he refuses the task that was given to him by Olympus. What hell would the Gods prepare for his insubordination? Would the Gods feed him to a snake, a lion? Would they let his body crisp in eternal flames? What if they do nothing? Even if he refuses, there's nothing else he can do. The Gods have offered him no alternative task.

So perhaps the Gods have nothing worse for him. His hell is the lack of alternatives. His hell is the illusion of his own autonomy. His hell is the illusion that he was ever greater than the boulder he was pushing. His hell is the futility of his situation.

***

“Maria!”

“What is it?”

“We can’t keep doing this. The soldiers...the stories. I heard Eduardo got shoved against the ground after he was protesting the president’s decision. I know that you care about—“

“Well we can’t do nothing!”

The boy wraps his hands around hers, his face so close she can feel his frantic breath. 

“I don’t want to see you get hurt.”

Maria cannot meet his eyes.

"You don't want to see yourself get hurt."

The boy throws his hands in the air.

"Maybe. God, I'm scared, okay? And I'm scared about you too."

Maria takes a deep breath and looks the boy in his eyes.

“We have to keep fighting.”

The boy scoffs.

“We can’t keep fighting if we’re dead.”

***

Through his many endeavors, Sisyphus considers if he’s learned anything. Should he try to? Should he take each failure in his stride, knowing full well the next attempt will end with a similar conclusion? Should he continue to strive for salvation when there is no promise of a better future?

***

Two pundits discuss the state of the nation:

“Do you not think there is a problem when our country’s biggest industries, not to mention our government, is controlled by a couple of political families?”

“They are doing a great job. That is the way our country was—is. I do not trust that the people of this country can govern themselves.”

“I can’t believe—my God, you’re a kleptocrat! This system is corrupt! Can you find—and I know it’s difficult with a heart so rotten—any empathy for these protesters?”

The other pundit vehemently shakes his head. 

“I would never sympathize with those communists. The USSR has already demonstrated the path of this political ideology will only end in starvation, tyranny, and genocide.”

The other pundit’s eyes fall, his frustration sizzling off into vaporous resignation.

“Even so—even if I accept that assertion, are they not starving already? Do they not deserve to fight? When they are being stomped on like cockroaches in the street?”

***

As the seasons pass, sometimes there is a flower that blooms in Sisyphus’s heart. It breathes a new sense of determination. It’s petals wrap around his lips, his legs, his hands. He thinks what life will be like at the top of the hill, where the flower can quench its thirst by a stream, where the flower can grow as tall as it wishes in clear sunlight, where the flower can benefit from a more nurturing soil. 

But as he nurtures the flower inside his heart, eventually it grows too big. The flower's roots wrap around his lungs; they sap him of oxygen. Thorns bristle against his sides; they constrict his chest. The weight of the flower crushes the determination it once sprouted.

When that time comes, Sisyphus severs the flower from his body. The flower rots at the bottom of the hill. Then Sisyphus pushes the boulder up once again, knowing full well he won’t succeed.

***

The youth are enamored with a new politician. The large frames of his glasses, his greased back hair. They love him for his wit. They love him for hand gestures. They love him for his faith. His rhetoric cuts through their doubts like scissors. 

“First lady,” he said on camera, before martial law, before he is exiled. “How can we afford your shoes, your jewels, your extravagance?”

“Mr. President,” he said on camera, before martial law, before he is exiled. “How can we afford your military, your troops, your ego?”

One night he is on call with the first lady. She warns him never to come back. His own wife worries when he says he will. 

But people cheer his name.

***

How well should Sisyphus adapt to his predicament? To what extent should he quell his desire to be something greater than the task he has been assigned? To what extent should he hope that one day the boulder will rest at the top of the hill and the Gods will let him go?

A wise sage once wrote that to accept whatever fate one encounters in life without question is the most righteous attitude a person can strive for. The world was constructed by the Gods, their will divinely intelligent. All things in nature agree to this will: a deer eats whatever grass it is given, a tree grows where there is sun. They live this way because they do, they do because they are given, and that is enough.

***

The president delivers a speech to foreign press. He is revered as an ally against the spreading influence of communism in the East. The reporters question him on his decision to implement martial law. He responds:

“There is invasion and insurrection. It was my duty. It was my right.”

His baggy white button up remains unscathed by the political turmoil. His body language remains carefully guarded, and the room floats in an anxious tension. Nonetheless everyone is complacent. Reporters scribble on fancy notepads, wearing tailored suits as they sit in padded wooden chairs, enjoying luminescent chandeliers and cleaned carpet floors. In the president’s own country, prisoners enjoy solitary confinement and unsanitary bathrooms. They’ve been battered and abused, treated like sexual objects or punching bags.

***

Sisyphus ponders the sage’s wisdom. Should a pig agree to the farmer when the farmer has a knife to the pig’s throat? Does the oxen agree to be a slave when it’s born only to work the fields? What about humans, damned to the hellish world they are created in? To accept one’s fate without question is mindless. To think is to suffer, and suffering is feeling, and to be human is to think and feel. To ignore that suffering—to be content with unfairness—goes against what it means to be human. To long for a better world is the human condition, and that cannot be evil.

***

A mother notices her daughter try to sneak off to a rally.

``“Maria.” She hisses from her bedroom. “This is the last time I’ll warn you.”

Maria’s eyes are cold and dull. 

“They killed her. Those soldiers, they did unspeakable things.”

Her mother gasps but recollects herself.

“Which is why you should stay out of this. So you don't end up like your friend. So you don’t end up dead.”

Maria sighs as she slips past the front door. 

***

Sisyphus resolves to roll the boulder one more time. It's spring. The flower in his heart begins to bloom again.

***

The politician gathers his bags from the overhead bin. He has returned by plane to his country, ignoring his exile. He is accompanied by a foreign reporter and a few political allies. His return calls for celebration. And yet…

Two men board the plane. They are stiff. The politician remains calm as they escort him out. 

The reporter remembers what the politician had said earlier that day. “Make sure your camera is ready,” he said with a smile. “This could all end in minutes.”

“Shoot! SHOOT!”

In a single second, a bouquet of bullets is delivered to two.

The politician, known for his big frames and his charming wit, is scrapped in a body bag. A scapegoat, known by no one, rests in another. 

***

The Gods watch as Sisyphus drops the boulder, having made it to the top of the hill. Sisyphus can’t help but scream. 

Then Sisyphus climbs back down, and in a new breath, tries again. This time Sisyphus is sure he'll make it.