ANelson

“Don’t you understand? When you’re standing on their side, you’re the bizarre genius, the miraculous hero, the force of the rebellion, the flower that blooms alone. But the second your voice differs from theirs, you’ve lost your mind, you’ve ignored morality, you’ve walked the crooked path.”
― 墨香铜臭, 魔道祖师 [Mó Dào Zǔ Shī]

“What were you before you met me?"
"I think I was drowning"
"And what are you now?"
"Water”
― Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous

“I don't know then that one day I won't be seventeen. I don't know that youth doesn't last, that it's only a moment, and then it disappears and by the time you finally realize it, it's too late. It's finished, vanished, lost. There are some around me who can sense it; the adults repeat it constantly but I don't listen. Their words roll over me but don't stick. Like water off the feathers of a duck's back. I'm an idiot. An easygoing idiot.”
― Philippe Besson, Lie With Me

“Too much joy, I swear, is lost in our desperation to keep it.”
― Ocean Vuong, On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous