[Image: “Every Day a New Balancing Act,” by John E. Simpson. (Shared here under a Creative Commons License; for more information, see this page at RAMH.)]
From whiskey river (last three stanzas):
what they did yesterday afternoon
they set my aunts house on fire
i cried the way women on tv do
folding at the middle
like a five pound note.
i called the boy who use to love me
tried to ‘okay’ my voice
i said hello
he said warsan, what’s wrong, what’s happened?i’ve been praying,
and these are what my prayers look like;
dear god
i come from two countries
one is thirsty
the other is on fire
both need water.later that night
i held an atlas in my lap
ran my fingers across the whole world
and whispered
where does it hurt?it answered
everywhere
everywhere
everywhere.
(Warsan Shire [source])
…and:
I am of the order whose purpose is not to teach the world a lesson but to explain that school is over.
(Henry Miller [source, apparently (unconfirmed)])
…and:
Do you remember the happiest day of your life? What about the saddest? Do you ever wonder if sadness and happiness can be combined, to make a deep purple feeling, not good, not bad, but remarkable simply because you didn’t have to live on one side or the other?
(Ocean Voung [source])
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