Salena Godden > Quotes

“Let's hope I come when you are busy doing something you want to live for. Let us hope I come when you are doing something you would die for, and let's hope that if you kill yourself, you are well over 40 years old, because to kill yourself before age 40 is like murdering a stranger,”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“Sex and food and drink and books. You really don’t need much else. Maybe a nice view of the sky. Some shoes that don’t hurt. A bed and roof that won’t leak. Some singing, some music and tempo. A heart full and a soul fed, a head full of dreams and possibilities, what more could you possibly want? What more is there?”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“Because once you have known Mrs Death there is no unknowing her. You have a mourning that sits inside you. It’s like having a stone in your centre; time smooths the edges like a pebble in a river, but it’s always there – a stone is a stone. If you’ve known loss, you’ll know this stone, you will carry a stone of your own – this pain and weight – and you’ll know what I mean. It is a tattoo under the inside of you that cannot fade or be removed. There is no unknowing the memory that a certain date and time triggers: the smell of the season, the time, the weather . . . We replay it, the jolt, the shock, the finality of death.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“Living is not as easy as they all make it seem. It is not as simple as breathe in and breathe out. It is not as simple as sleep, eat, work, repeat, sleep, eat, work, repeat. It is not as easy as they all make it look. You made it to today. You made it this far, well done you, and thank you. Thank you. Thank yourself. Thank you.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“Spoiler Alert: We all die in the end”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“That’s the stuff, darling, the love. Love, the love, the love. LOVE. That’s what living was always about.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“You live forever in your words, in hearts and memories, in your creations and connections. The seeds you sow, the child you raise, the song you sing, the story you write with your time here. You are eternal, you are forever present in your oily DNA and your unique thumb print.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“Your shade is not skin deep. Your shade isnot just about your heart and soul; your religion and spirituality, your elders and your history, your connection to a country, to geography and to a time and place. Your shade is an industry, your shade is a token, shade is a passport, shade is a cage and shade is a status.

You tick: Other.”
― Salena Godden, The Good Immigrant

“You know, since you are here and shit, you may as well give a shit”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“But every time I go to the cafe I remember that writing a book can hurt, it can hurt as much as climbing a mountain. Not writing a book hurts too. Not writing, well, that's like swallowing a mountain and having it jammed in your throat, unclimbed, unchallenged, unspoken, and unwritten.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“We are puppets, we are children, without thinking we so often mouth the words our lips are taught.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“Human colour is the colour I'm truly interested in, the colour of your humanity. May the size of your heart and the depth of your soul be your currency. welcome aboard my Good Ship. Let us sail to the colourful island of misex identity. You can eat from the cooking pot of mixed culture and bathe in the cool shade of being mixed-race. There is no need for a passport. There are no borders. We are all citizens of the world. Whatever shade you are, bring your light, bring your colour, bring your music and your books, your stories and your histories, and climb aboad. United as a people we are a million majestic colours, together we are a glorious stained-glass window. We are building a cathedral of otherness, brick by brick and book by book. Raise your glass of rum, let's toast to the minorities who are the majority. There's no stopping time, nor the blurring of lines or the blending of shades. With a spirit of hope I leave you now. I drink to our sameness and to our unique differences. This is the twenty-first century and we share this, we live here, in the future. It is a beautiful morning, it is first light on the time of being other, so get out from that shade and feel the warmth of being outside.
You tick: Other.”
― Salena Godden

“Death is a bitch, Life is a bitch, but it’s in poor taste to speak ill of the living.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“I dont know why
I put the china rabbit
In my suitcase and
Brought her to Ireland
I sit her on this table
Looking at me
As I write this
There are things
That we hold on
We hold on tightly
Time can pass
And years go by
And these things
And these objects
And these people
And these ideas
That we held so tightly
We have to let them go
We hold them in
Hold them down to be
Who we think they are
What we want them to be and what they mean to us and holding on to people
Like old ideas and bad habits
Or like china rabbits
Now we don't need to be
Doing that now
Do we.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“Human colour is the colour I’m truly interested in, the colour of your humanity. May the size of your heart and the depth of your soul be your currency. Welcome aboard my Good Ship. Let us sail to the colourful island of mixed identity.
"SHADE" - Salena Godden”
― Salena Godden

“So take today and blow its mind; take this today and suck it dry. Take today and fill it with the best of you. Take today and down it in one, take today like a shot of petrol and set your day alight.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“The survival of the hero is up to you all now. It is important, now more than ever, to fight for all of this, to fight for your rights, for your freedoms, for your art, poetry and music. Because you all need to be heroes, to step up, to speak up, to support each other. It is all about kindness, and you need the doers and the creators. You must pay attention to the ones who listen and hear and do and can and will and share. And to the people of science and art, books and music, otherwise what is the actual point of all this? What was the point? Why are you all here if not for that? You are hear for love. To share the love.

When hate is rising, then love can only rise higher.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“You cannot go poking skeletons in the closet without making maggots wriggle." - Springfield Road”
― Salena Godden, Springfield Road

“It is hard to keep up with her, to be honest. My sister. Life. She is an over-achiever, little Miss Abundance. My sister! Imagine growing up with that, with her for a sister! Just imagine if Life was your sister! Eggy little goody two-shows eggy fart face. The earth would be horribly over-crowded if U didn’t eat her eggs and destroy her spawn and do my job efficiently. She is constantly vomiting, and puking cherry pips and cherry blossoms everywhere. Every time Life lays an egg, Death eats an egg. All who come from eggs are connected, every creature, every egg, every mammal and fish and insect. Eggs. Salt. Birth. Blood. Death. And on and on it goes, never ending . . . eggy eggs eggy eggs . . . What came first, the chicken or the egg? Life came first! She always comes first! Ha! Selfish fish fishy eggy fart face.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“Here I was born and I did grow teeth.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death: Salena Godden

“This Journey is in reverse, my father is the stop I missed, he is the station I dreamt of when I was sleeping”
― Salena Godden

“But someone once told me, you cannot climb a well from the middle, you must fall right to the bottom. Once you are there, in the cold, alone and ankle deep in slime, you’ll look up and you’ll get a real sense of the dark and the work involved to climb towards the light, the truth.”
― Salena Godden, Springfield Road

“Wherever you live, where you are from, it seems it is all about shade. Universally we are divided and whatever shade you are born it is not right or good enough. We are in a giant brainwash, we are being organised by colour and tone, the natural shade of your skin must be improved, altered and filtered.”
― Salena Godden, The Good Immigrant

“And you, you’re only human. Mankind. Woman kind. You only have one job: be kind.”
― Salena Godden, Mrs Death Misses Death

“My Dear,
These are the memories of my life as a child. This is the story of the world before I was here, the universe I was born into, that I came to love before I had to grow up, find rent and suffer hangovers. This is the story of how I became this overgrown adult with crooked teeth and scars. - Springfield Road”
― Salena Godden, Springfield Road

“Pessimism is for Lightweights

Think of those that marched this road before
And those that will march here in years to come
The road in shadow and the road in the sun
The road before us and the road all done
History is watching us and what will we become

This road is all flags and milestones
Immigrant blood and sweat and tears
Built this city, built this country
Made this road last all these years

This road is made of protest
And those not permitted to vote
And those that are still fighting to speak
With a boot stamping on their throat

There is power and strength in optimism
To have faith and to stay true to you
Because if you can look in the mirror
And have belief and promise you
Will share wonder in living things
Beauty, dreams, books and art
Love your neighbour and be kind
And have an open heart

Then you're already winning at living
You speak up, you show up and stand tall
It's silence that is complicit
It's apathy that hurts us all

Pessimism is for lightweights
There is no straight white line
It's the bumps and curves and obstacles
That make this road yours and mine

Pessimism is for lightweights
This road was never easy and straight
And living is all about living alive and lively
And love will conquer hate”
― Salena Godden

“They say that it is always poets that die in wars, and I never got over a sense of being in the trenches.”
― Salena Godden, Springfield Road