Ally Norris

“Joy lift her spirit, joy attune her voice;
To her may all things live, from pole to pole,
Their life the eddying of her living soul!
O simple spirit, guided from above,
Dear Lady! friend devoutest of my choice,
Thus mayest thou ever, evermore rejoice.”
― Samuel Taylor Coleridge, The Complete Poems

“So it goes with me day by day and age by age, I tell myself. Locked in the deadly progression of moon and stars. I shake my head, muttering darkly on shaded paths, holding conversation with the only friend and comfort this world allows, my shadow.”
― John Gardner, Grendel

“If they could make me stop loving you—that would be the real betrayal.’ She thought it over. ‘They can’t do that. . . . They can make you say anything—anything—but they can’t make you believe it. They can’t get inside you.”
― George Orwell, 1984

“I was excessively afraid of being defined as a woman before I was seen as myself.”
― Nagata Kabi, My Lesbian Experience with Loneliness