- parable of the sower, octavia e. butler
- all i do is observe and take notes, trying to put things down in ways that are as powerful, as simple, and as direct as i feel them. i can never do that. i keep trying, but i can't. i'm not good enough as a writer or poet or whatever it is i need to be. i don't know what to do about that. it drives me frantic sometimes. i'm getting better, but so slowly. (p. 78)
- a tree cannot grow in its parents' shadows. (p. 82)
- waiting is terrible. waiting to be older is worse than other kinds of waiting because there's nothing you can do to make it happen faster. (p. 89)
- the cancer journals, audre lorde
- i must let this pain flow through me and pass on. if i resist or try to stop it, it will detonate inside me. (p. 12)
- in the recognition of the existence of love lies the answer to despair. (p. 13)
- fear and pain and despair do not disappear. they only become slowly less and less important. (p. 13)
- i feel like another woman, de-chrysalised and become a broader, stretched-out me, strong and excited, a muscle flexed and honed for action. (14)
- when i dare to be powerful, too use my strength in the service of my vision, then it becomes less important whether or not i am unafraid. (p. 15)
- as women we were raised to fear. if i cannot banish fear completely, i can learn to count with it less. for then fear becomes not a tyrant against which i waste my energy fighting, but a companion, not particularly desirable, yet one whose knowledge can be useful. (p. 15)
- i had to remind myself that i had lived through it all, already. i had known the pain, and survived it. (p. 16)
- how do i provide myself with the best physical and psychic nourishment to repair past, and minimize future damage to my body? (p. 16)
- i have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. (p. 19)
- and i began to recognize a source of power within myself that comes from the knowledge that while it is most desirable not to be afraid, learning to put fear into a perspective gave me great strength. (p. 20)
- my silences had not protected me. your silence will not protect you. (p. 20)
- but my daughter, when i told her of our topic and my difficulty with it, said, "tell them about how you're never really a whole person if you remain silent, because there's always that one little piece inside of you that wants to be spoken out, and if you keep ignoring it, it gets madder and madder and hotter and hotter, and if you don't speak it out one day it will just up and punch you in the mouth." (p. 21)
- the flame was dim and flickering, but it was a welcome relief to the long coldness. (p. 25)
- whatever the message is, may i survive the delivery of it. is letting go a process or a price? what am i paying for, not seeing sooner? learning at the edge? letting go of something precious but no longer needed? (p. 26)
- i feel always tender in the wrong places. (p. 27)
- i felt inside myself for what i really felt and wanted, and that was to live and to love and to do my work, as hard as i could and for as long as i could. (p. 32)
- i think perhaps i was afraid to continue being myself." (p. 33)
- well, i'm dealing with it as best i can. i wish i didn't have to, and i don't even know if i'm doing it right, but i sure am glad that i had this extra year to learn to love me in a different way. (p. 35)
- i knew if i lived i could live well. i knew that if the life spark kept burning there would be fuel; if i could want to live i would always find a way, and a way that was best for me. (p. 40)
- i carry tattooed upon my heart a list of names of women who did not survive, and there is always a space left for one more, my own. that is to remind me that even survival is only part of the task. the other part is teaching. (p. 40)
- either i would love my body...or remain forever alien to myself. (p. 44)
- my work is to inhabit the silences with which i have lived and fill them with myself until they have the sounds of brightest day and the loudest thunder. and then there will be no room left inside of me for what has been except as memory of sweetness enhancing what i can and is to be. (p. 46)
- i am who the world and i have never seen before. (p. 48)
- THE WORLD WILL NOT STOP IF I MAKE A MISTAKE. (p. 48)
- now i am anxious for more living – to sample and partake of the sweetness of each moment and each wonder who walks with me through my days. and now i feel again the large sweetness of the women who stayed open to me when i needed that openness like rain, who made themselves available. (p. 53)
- i am often afraid to this day, but even more so angry at having to be afraid, of having to spend so much of my energies, interrupting my work, simply upon fear and worry. (p. 54)
- i must be responsible for finding a way to handle those concerns so that they don't enervate me completely, or bleed off the strength i need to move and act and feel and write and love and lie out in the sun and listen to the new spring birdsong. (p. 54)
- a lifetime of loving women had taught me that when women love each other, physical change does not alter that love. (p. 56)
- self scrutiny and an evaluation of our lives, while painful, can be rewarding and strengthening journeys toward a deeper self. for as we open ourselves more and more to the genuine conditions of our lives, women become less and less willing to tolerate those conditions unaltered, or to passively accept external and destructive controls over our lives and our identities. (p. 58)
- i am personally affronted by the message that i am only acceptable if i look 'right' or 'normal,' where those norms have nothing to do with my own perceptions of who i am. (p. 64)
- in order to keep me available to myself, and able to concentrate my energies upon the challenges of those worlds through which i move, i must consider what my body means to me. i must also separate those external demands about how i look and feel to others, from what i really want for my own body, and how i feel to my selves. (p. 65)
- it is physically important for me to be loving my life. (p. 73)
- the collected poetry of nikki giovanni, 1968-1998, nikki giovanni
- and i remembered the expectation / and the little surprises her albums / used to bring / the little love notes that told someone / what i felt and the ultimate surprise / when she didn't sing for me and my love / no more and the pain was so deep / cause the pleasure had been so complete. (p. 134)
- we must learn / to bear the pleasures / as we have borne the pains. (p. 145)
- but i shall pad around my house / in my purple soft-soled shoes / i'm very happy now / it's not so very neat, you know but it's my / life. (p. 199)
- i think it might be good / to decide rather than to need. (p. 200)
- i hope i die / warmed / by the life that i tried / to live. (p. 203)
- there is always something / of the child / in us that wants / a strong hand to hold / through the hungry season / of growing up. p. (260)
jan 2 2022 ∞
feb 7 2023 +