Warsan Shire Quotes

“At the end of the day, it isn’t where I came from. Maybe home is somewhere I’m going and never have been before.”
― Warsan Shire

“The ego hurts you like this: you become obsessed with the one person who does not love you. blind to the rest who do.”
― Warsan Shire

“By the time I’ve finished with you,
you won’t know whether you’ve been kissed or cut,
whether you were loved or butchered.
and either way you probably won’t care,
just grateful you came close enough to touch.”
― Warsan Shire

“all those nights with the phone warming the side of my face like the sun.”
― Warsan Shire

“My body is burning with the shame of not belonging, […]”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“Her body is one long sigh.”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“I did not beg him to stay
because I was begging God
that he would not leave.”
― Warsan Shire

“[…] in dark rooms, mapping out
each other’s bodies,
claiming whole countries
with their mouths.”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“Later that night she picked the polish off
with her front teeth until the bed you shared
for seven years seemed speckled with glitter
and blood.”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“[…] a clockwork of fingers finding places to own—
under the tongue, collarbone, bottom lip,
arch of foot.”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“Is that what we’re here for?
To sit at kitchen tables, counting
on our fingers the ones who died,
those who left, and the others who were taken by the police,
or by drugs
or by illness
or by other women?
It makes no sense.
Look at your skin, her mouth, these lips, those eyes,
my God, listen to that laugh.
The only darkness we should allow into our lives is the night,
for even then, we have the moon.”
― Warsan Shire,Our Men Do Not Belong To Us

“[…] but she cannot make him eat, like you.”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“this is your woman
who would sweep your khat
but doesn’t
bc you don’t even chew it”
― Xayaat Muhummed, The Breast Mountains Of All Time Are In Hargeisa