Magdalena Mysliwiec

“You can’t build a life
on another human being. We’re foundations
of sand. We’re Atlas buckling under the sky.”
― Elisabeth Hewer, Wishing for Birds

“It is our custom
to consume
the person we love.
Taboo flesh: swollen
genitalia nipples
the scrotum the vulva
the soles of the feet
the palm of the hand
heart and liver taste best.
Cannibalism is blessed.

I'll wear your jawbone
round my neck
listen to your vertebrae
bone tapping bone in my wrists.
I'll string your fingers round my waist -
what a rigorous embrace.
Over my heart I'll wear
a brooch with a lock of hair.
Nights I'll sleep cradling
your skull sharpening
my teeth on your toothless grin.

Sundays there's Mass and communion
and I'll put your relics to rest.”
― Gloria E. Anzaldúa, Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza

“Books saved my sanity, knowledge opened the locked places in me and taught me first how to survive and then how to soar.”
― Gloria E. Anzaldúa

“Nobody’s going to save you. No one’s going to cut you down, cut the thorns thick around you. No one’s going to storm the castle walls nor kiss awake your birth, climb down your hair, nor mount you onto the white steed. There is no one who will feed the yearning. Face it. You will have to do, do it yourself.”
― Gloria Anzaldua