Apoorva Shetty

“Things I Want Decided

Which shouldn't exist
in this world,
the one who forgets
or the one
who is forgotten?

Which is better,
to love
one who has died
or not to see
each other when you're alive?

Which is better,
the distant lover
you long for
or the one you see daily
without desire?

Which is the least unreliable
among fickle things —
the swift rapids,
a flowing river,
or this human world?”
― Izumi Shikibu, The Ink Dark Moon: Love Poems by Ono no Komachi and Izumi Shikibu, Women of the Ancient Court of Japan

“The emotional residue of that night was like a drop of arsenic falling into the still waters of my soul, nothing having changed from the taste of it but everything now tainted.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer

“As Hegel said, tragedy was not the conflict between right and wrong but right and right, a dilemma none of us who wanted to participate in history could escape.”
― Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer

“I understood why Catholics confess,even though they must know priests share the same sins, or worse.It does not matter who was listening; what mattered was leaving the wound open for the sun to purify and the rainwater to wash.”
― Paulo Coelho