Warsan Shire

“My alone feels so good, I'll only have you if you're sweeter than my solitude.”

“With you, intimacy colours my voice. even ‘hello’ sounds like ‘come here'.”

“Loving you was like going to war; I never came back the same.”

“How far have you walked for men who’ve never held your feet in their laps?”

“Your daughter is ugly. She knows loss intimately, carries whole cities in her belly. As a child, relatives wouldn’t hold her. She was splintered wood and sea water. They said she reminded th...”

“Don't assume, ask. Be kind. Tell the truth. Don't say anything you can't stand behind fully. Have integrity. Tell people how you feel.”

“You are her mother. Why did you not warn her, hold her like a rotting boat and tell her that men will not love her if she is covered in continents, if her teeth are small colonies, if her st...”

“Sometimes it feels like someone else is wearing my body.”

“HOME no one leaves home unless home is the mouth of a shark you only run for the border when you see the whole city running as well your neighbors running faster than you breath bloody in th...”

“Later that night she picked the polish off with her front teeth until the bed you shared for seven years seemed speckled with glitter and blood.”

“[…] but she cannot make him eat, like you.”

“We took such care of tomorrow, but died on the way there.”

“I hope I’ll always believe in love. Even if love shames me and tries to destroy me, I hope I’ll want to start again.”