The Thankless Job of Dying: A Reflection on Mortality, Art, and the Human Condition
There’s a line in Janiru Liyanage’s poem The Job that has stuck with me long after reading it: ‘Dying is a thankless job.’ What makes this particularly fascinating is how it captures the absurdity and weight of mortality in just six words. Personally, I think this line is more than just a poetic observation—it’s a mirror held up to society’s discomfort with death. We spend our lives avoiding the topic, believing it’s the easy part, only to be blindsided when it arrives. Liyanage’s poem forces us to confront this reality, not through melodrama, but through the quiet, unspoken moments that define the end of a life.
The Weight of Witnessing
One thing that immediately stands out is the poet’s role as a witness to their great-aunt’s suffering. The image of her struggling to breathe, the fluorescent light casting shadows on her thinning body—these details are haunting because they’re so mundane. What many people don’t realize is that death is often not dramatic; it’s a slow, awkward process filled with moments like spoonfuls of room-temperature baby corn and unwashed lips. Liyanage’s choice to include these specifics is deliberate. It’s not about shock value but about humanizing the experience. If you take a step back and think about it, this is where the true weight of the poem lies—in its refusal to romanticize or sanitize death.
The Language of Medicine: A Barrier or a Bridge?
A detail that I find especially interesting is the use of fruit metaphors by doctors to describe tumors. ‘This lump is as big as a grape,’ they say, as if comparing cancer to a piece of fruit could somehow make it less terrifying. What this really suggests is the disconnect between medical language and human emotion. From my perspective, this is where the poem shines—it highlights how we try to make the incomprehensible palatable. But does it work? Personally, I think it only underscores the inadequacy of words in the face of suffering. The poet’s great-aunt’s brain tumor, described as ‘the size of a kumquat,’ feels both clinical and surreal, a reminder that even language fails us when it matters most.
The Ethical Dilemma of Art and Suffering
This raises a deeper question: What is the responsibility of the artist when depicting suffering? Liyanage’s self-accusing lines about not acknowledging their great-aunt in the poem or using grief to ‘make it work’ are raw and unsettling. In my opinion, this tension is what makes the poem so powerful. It’s not just about the act of dying but about the act of creating art from pain. What does it mean to beautify suffering? Is it exploitation, or is it a way to honor the experience? I don’t have the answers, but what’s clear is that Liyanage is grappling with these questions openly, inviting us to do the same.
The Contrast Between Life and Legacy
The poem’s conclusion—a vision of an ‘uneventful, upper-middle-class suburban life’—feels almost jarring after the intensity of the opening. But this contrast is intentional. It’s a reminder that life goes on, even as we confront death. The image of children running through fig trees, ignoring the fruit salad their parent worked so hard on, is particularly striking. What makes this fascinating is how it reflects the impermanence of our efforts. We strive for perfection, for legacy, but in the end, what remains? The figs, picked by hand, taste sweeter precisely because they weren’t part of the plan. This, to me, is the poem’s quiet rebellion—a rejection of the idea that life must be curated to be meaningful.
The Broader Implications: Mortality in a Culture of Avoidance
If you take a step back and think about it, Liyanage’s poem is more than just a personal reflection—it’s a critique of how we, as a society, handle death. We’re so obsessed with youth, productivity, and perfection that we’ve forgotten how to die, let alone how to talk about it. The ‘thankless job’ of dying is not just about the individual; it’s about the collective denial that makes the process even more isolating. What this really suggests is that we need to rethink our relationship with mortality. Maybe, just maybe, acknowledging the thanklessness of dying is the first step toward making it a little less lonely.
Final Thoughts
Liyanage’s poem is not an easy read, but it’s an essential one. It’s a reminder that death is not just an ending but a part of life—messy, uncomfortable, and unavoidably human. Personally, I think the greatest art is the kind that leaves you with more questions than answers, and The Job does exactly that. It’s a poem that doesn’t seek to resolve the tension between life and death, art and suffering, but instead invites us to sit with it. And in that sitting, perhaps, we find a little more understanding—not just of death, but of what it means to be alive.
