Toska

“Beauty will no longer be forbidden.”
― Hélène Cixous, The Laugh of the Medusa

“Ignorance is no excuse when once we know that ignorance is the only possible excuse.”
― Alfred Korzybski, Science and Sanity: An Introduction to Non-Aristotelian Systems and General Semantics

“They ask me how did you get here? Can’t you see it on my body? The Libyan desert red with immigrant bodies, the Gulf of Aden bloated, the city of Rome with no jacket. I hope the journey meant more than miles because all of my children are in the water. I thought the sea was safer than the land. I want to make love, but my hair smells of war and running and running. I want to lay down, but these countries are like uncles who touch you when you’re young and asleep. Look at all these borders, foaming at the mouth with bodies broken and desperate. I’m the colour of hot sun on the face, my mother’s remains were never buried. I spent days and nights in the stomach of the truck; I did not come out the same. Sometimes it feels like someone else is wearing my body.”
― Warsan Shire, Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

“I think about you but I don't say it anymore.”
― Marguerite Duras, Hiroshima mon amour