Shigeki @shigeki - Tumblr Blog

A woman must stay alone for a long while until the hate men have for women has left her, and even longer until the jealousy women have for other women has left her, and longer still until the anger her children have for her has left her—until she is no longer a woman altered by the resentment of men, women, and children, no longer what others have forced her to be, but empty as a skull or a shell, filled only by whatever she pleases, forest air perhaps.

— Kiran Desai, The Loneliness of Sonia and Sunny

thirdity

“You write the beginning and then you go back and rewrite the beginning, and you never got off page one. It’s kind of a syndrome, and I have a rash piece of advice which is — Go on, page two, page three, and never look back. Get something finished, no matter how lousy it is. […] Perfectionists cannot get going unless they kind of do violence to their own instincts, and just blast ahead.”

— Ursula K. Le Guin, The Last Interview and Other Conversations

apocryphics

batbetbitbotbut

starting a collection

attributed to Lily Tomlin; Terry Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky; ilene_cecelia, reddit; Pratchett, Night Watch; Pratchett, A Hat Full of Sky; Pirkei Avot 2:21; Ursula K. le Guin, Tehanu

elodieunderglass

““The gods have no hands in this world but ours. If we fail Them, where then can They turn?””

— The Hallowed Hunt (World of the Five Gods) by Lois McMaster Bujold

alltheberries

"Es ist nicht deine Schuld, dass die Welt ist wie sie ist. Es wär nur deine Schuld, wenn sie so bleibt" - die ärzte

("It's not your fault that the world is like this. It would be your fault, if it stayed like this")

hoodlumwitchh

This is to inform you that I didn’t die young.

Jim Harrison, Barking

you-can-be-what-you-want-to-be

"Immature people crave and demand moral certainty: This is bad, this is good. Kids and adolescents struggle to find a sure moral foothold in this bewildering world; they long to feel they’re on the winning side, or at least a member of the team. To them, heroic fantasy may offer a vision of moral clarity. Unfortunately, the pretended Battle Between (unquestioned) Good and (unexamined) Evil obscures instead of clarifying, serving as a mere excuse for violence — as brainless, useless, and base as aggressive war in the real world."

Ursula K Le Guin at it again, being right as always

loveridden1999

― F. Scott Fitzgerald, The Sensible Thing

the-wave-finally-broke

A Litany for Survival

BY AUDRE LORDE

For those of us who live at the shoreline

standing upon the constant edges of decision

crucial and alone

for those of us who cannot indulge

the passing dreams of choice

who love in doorways coming and going

in the hours between dawns

looking inward and outward

at once before and after

seeking a now that can breed

futures

like bread in our children’s mouths

so their dreams will not reflect

the death of ours;

For those of us

who were imprinted with fear

like a faint line in the center of our foreheads

learning to be afraid with our mother’s milk

for by this weapon

this illusion of some safety to be found

the heavy-footed hoped to silence us

For all of us

this instant and this triumph

We were never meant to survive.

And when the sun rises we are afraid

It might not remain

when the sun sets we are afraid

it might not rise in the morning

when our stomachs are full we are afraid

of indigestion

when our stomachs are empty we are afraid

we may never eat again

when we are loved we are afraid

love will vanish

when we are alone we are afraid

love will never return

and when we speak we are afraid

our words will not be heard

nor welcomed

but when we are silent

we are still afraid

So it is better to speak

remembering

we were never meant to survive.

apocryphics

petaltexturedskies

All photographs are memento mori. To take a photograph is to participate in another person's (or thing's) mortality, vulnerability, mutability. Precisely by slicing out this moment and freezing it, all photographs testify to time's relentless melt.

Susan Sontag, On Photography (originally published in 1977)

insacredlight

firstfullmoon

hi!! if you could only read 10 poems again, which would those poems be? I just went through all of my collected poetry and created a top 10 list of poems that mean the most to me, and i thought it was a really fun and challenging exercise! i'm curious if we have any poems in common <3

OUGH. okay hardest question ever. keeping in mind those would be the only 10 poems I could ever read, I picked ones that are seminal to me & my relationship with poetry

“The Same City” by Terrance Hayes

“Magdalene—The Seven Devils” by Marie Howe

“October” by Louise Glück

“Having a Coke with You” by Frank O’Hara

“Intifada Incantation: Poem #8 for b.b.L.” by June Jordan

“[I aborted two daughters]” by Diane Seuss

“Snow and Dirty Rain” by Richard Siken

“Late Poem to My Father” by Sharon Olds

“The Colonel” by Carolyn Forché

“Turtle, Swan” by Mark Doty