Adriana Rueda

“Girls barely budding open their legs to make a living, alongside the toothless and rancid of breath; hair thick with lice, they all find customers if the price is right, against the wall or on sheets well-soiled. Their holes cost but a shilling. Skins grow thick and claws sharp.”
― Emmanuelle de Maupassant, The Gentlemen's Club

“OBITUARY

Certificate in hand, my school career
now finds its slow and certain end.
Last act, the iron curtain here
Closes on what I might have been.
One year more and I would have earned
my diploma, having played my part.
Instead this list of what I've learned,
States I was quiet, hardworking, smart.

Yes, gone those lovely days in time
When once I dozed to Schiller's "Clock,"
Though much preferred was Scheffler's rhyme.
Awakening me and signalling "stop."
Playing hooky, passing notes, my relinquished
School pass - all passe.
Only I remain, dismissed and hindered,
a ninth-grade student without a grade.
[September 11, 1939]
by Felice Schragenheim”
― Erica Fischer, Aimée & Jaguar: A Love Story, Berlin 1943

“She thought of people she had seen holding hands in movies, and why shouldn't she and Carol?”
― Patricia Highsmith, The Price of Salt

“I feel I stand in a desert with my hands outstretched, and you are raining down upon me.”
― Patricia Highsmith, The Price of Salt