Swetha Chodavarpu

“What broke your heart so bad
That you had to close every door,
That you say you have a dark soul
And can't utter the word 'love' anymore?”
― Sanhita Baruah

“There is a gentrification that is happening to cities, and there is a gentrification that is happening to the emotions too, with a similarly homogenising, whitening, deadening effect. Amidst the glossiness of late capitalism, we are fed the notion that all difficult feeling - depression, anxiety, loneliness, rage - are simply a consequence of unsettled chemistry, a problem to be fixed, rather than a response to structural injustice or, on the other hand, to the native texture of embodiment, of doing time, as David Wojnarowicz memorably put it, in a rented body, with all the attendant grief and frustration that entails.”
― Olivia Laing, The Lonely City: Adventures in the Art of Being Alone

“Perfect vision only gets in the way, Kyra thought. We all look better when the lights are out.”
― Victoria Avilan, The Art of Peeling an Orange

“I want to swallow you, have you melt into me and flow through my veins.”
― Han Kang, The Vegetarian