In the New Yorker this week, there’s a heartbreaking piece called “The Aquarium” by Aleksander Hemon. His baby, Isabel, was diagnosed with a rare, fast-growing brain tumor at 9 months and died within a year. It is profound, honest and raw. Here are two excerpts:

" After I told my tax accountant that Isabel was gravely ill, he said, ‘But you look good, and that’s the most important thing.'"

" Without Isabel, Teri and I were left with oceans of love we could no longer dispense; we found ourselves with an excess of time that we used to devote to her; we had to live in a void that could be filled only by Isabel. Her indelible absence is now an organ in our bodies, whose sole function is a continuous secretion of sorrow."

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