Michal

“Why? Why wouldn’t revenge make things better?
I think I saw then the difference between my anger toward my father and my anger toward Kera. It was like watching two icebergs separate, after moving together for a very long time. One was enormous, the size of an island; so enormous that I’d been standing atop it my entire life and never realized it was dragging me away from myself.
The other was a regular iceberg. Not small, because icebergs aren’t small; but not bottomless either. Contained within a definable space. Able to be seen all at once, if I was willing to dive into the cold, and look at it from below.
Was I willing to dive? What would that mean? Could I look at one anger, without being overwhelmed by all the others?
I wonder if angers can connect to each other, if you’re not careful. I wonder if they combine, and feed one another, strengthen each other, make each individual anger bigger than it’s supposed to be?
That seems dangerous. It seems like something to look out for, in a life of perils.”
― Kristin Cashore, Seasparrow

“The underdevelopment in Latin America is a consequence of development elsewhere, that we Latin Americans are poor because the ground we tread is rich, and that places privileged by nature have been cursed by history. In this world of ours, a world of powerful centers and subjugated outposts, there is no wealth that must not be held in some suspicion.”
― Eduardo Galeano, Open Veins of Latin America: Five Centuries of the Pillage of a Continent

“I remember something else from the time I spent trapped. I remember Bitterblue’s voice, calling down from above. I remember how inconsolable she was, terrified that I was stranded in a place she wouldn’t be able to reach me. And I remember that even in that moment, my own pain began to shift into the wish to comfort her pain.
I lose myself in that wish. I disappear. Suddenly Bitterblue is there, and I am gone. It’s not her fault. It’s my whole thing, right? I disappear from myself. It’s a way of being I got stuck inside, a long time ago.
I’ve been thinking about how to get unstuck. Even if it hurts.”
― Kristin Cashore, Seasparrow

“ It’s like I’m drowning. The sadness is too great.
Girl breathing, said Hope.
She’d startled me. Dripping with snot and tears, I stared at her over my figurines. Are you listening to my thoughts, Hope?
Girl told them to me. Girl isn’t drowning. Girl breathing.
I feel like I’m drowning.
Girl’s lungs full of air. Expanding.
I took a long, deep breath, paying attention to my lungs filling with air.
See? she said. Hope right.”
― Kristin Cashore, Seasparrow