Diana Whitney

“my greed for love, for my own perfection, reeks of desperation, but it is me and i am holy in my unholiness, so wonderfully messy, that i can’t help but begin to win myself over.”
― Diana Whitney, You Don't Have to Be Everything: Poems for Girls Becoming Themselves

“What Do Women Want?” Kim Addonizio I want a red dress. I want it flimsy and cheap, I want it too tight, I want to wear it until someone tears it off me. I want it sleeveless and backless, this dress, so no one has to guess what’s underneath. I want to walk down the street past Thrifty’s and the hardware store with all those keys glittering in the window, past Mr. and Mrs. Wong selling day-old donuts in their café, past the Guerra brothers slinging pigs from the truck and onto the dolly, hoisting the slick snouts over their shoulders. I want to walk like I’m the only woman on earth and I can have my pick. I want that red dress bad. I want it to confirm your worst fears about me, to show you how little I care about you or anything except what I want. When I find it, I’ll pull that garment from its hanger like I’m choosing a body to carry me into this world, through the birth-cries and the love-cries too, and I’ll wear it like bones, like skin, it’ll be the goddamned dress they bury me in.”
― Diana Whitney, You Don't Have to Be Everything: Poems for Girls Becoming Themselves