Rémy Ngamije > Quotes

“The rich refuse to send the elevator back down when they reach the top.”
― Rémy Ngamije, The Eternal Audience of One

“It's easy to live and work with someone when you don't owe them an apology. But when you apologize for the fucked up shit you did then you need to carry the guilt and the shame.”
― Rémy Ngamije, The Eternal Audience of One

“Isn't that what apologies are? Acknowledgment of guilt and shame. And the other person takes your wrongdoing and agrees to carry it and le t you be human again. That's why I don't believe weak people can forgive. What you're going to do when a weak person forgives you? They can't harm you, they can't take anything from you. Forgiveness from the weak is just words. Forgiveness, real forgiveness, requires the other person to remember, not to forget. When people forget the reason they forgave, the forgiven forget to earn their forgiveness.”
― Rémy Ngamije, The Eternal Audience of One

“That's the one thing the missionaries got right when they landed. They managed to stamp automatic forgiveness into every black man's soul. Forgive and forget. That was the game plan. First give them Jesus and the Sacred Power of Forgiveness and put the Fear of Eternal Damnation in them. Then take the land. And make sure the forgiveness gene is passed down from poor father to pauper son, dispossessed mother to despondent daughter, so in three hundred years' time their children can't come back to claim their shit.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“Lindo, Rinzlo, Cicero, Franco, and I walked the first path together. It was called foolishness.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“I’m the Sage of the Six Paths.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“There is no finite time for recovery. Some guys take longer than others. Some never heal, some master the shit and wander through life like functioning alcoholics, heartsore, sour as fuck. But they still show up for work, they still date, they even marry, they have kids. I guess if there’s a closet, a negro is always going to find room for another skeleton.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“Redemption, in my case, meant realizing that people are the worst things that can happen to each other. The charging lion cannot change its teeth nor can the poisonous snake cure its bite, each is living out its nature. I wanted to happen less to people, and to stop cooking guinea fowls.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“She had one law: my children, my family, my house, my farm, my land, my body, my mind, my spirit, my rules.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“When we were clowns, children, and things—before we sprouted personalities, individual hopes, and collective guilt; before we reconciled all aspects of our conflicting beings—”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“I forgot that footsteps make the path.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“It’s my experience that money alters destinies forever. Kismet for chaos is for broke people. The rich just send karma back to the kitchen if it comes out under- or overcooked.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“LOVE IS A NEGLECTED THING (OR, CORINTHIANS)”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“This is how grief works: it mines your being for guilt and makes it bubble and froth to the fore. It mutates cells, weakens bone, and deforms character.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape

“When we grew older there were other paths: wrath, grief, lust, loneliness, and redemption. I walked them all.”
― Rémy Ngamije, Only Stars Know the Meaning of Space: A Literary Mixtape