“I Never Change, I Simply Become More Myself.”

“The fact that someone else loves you doesn’t rescue you from the project of loving yourself.”

— Sahaj Kohli

i can feel the waves crushing through my body

happiness

sadness

back and forth

they break, i dont

1,2. Vincent van Gogh | 3. Kassia St. Clair | 4. Vincent van Gogh | 5. Jeff Sobel (On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous By Ocean Vuong) | 6. Hannah Gadsby | 7. Alireza Sadaghdar | 8. Richard Brautigan | 9. Ocean Vuong | 10. Olha Darchuk | 11. Vladimir Nabokov

Blessed are those who do not fear solitude, who are not afraid of their own company, who are not always desperately looking for something to do, something to amuse themselves with, something to judge. If you are never alone, you cannot know yourself.

Paulo Coelho, Manuscript Found in Accra

it felt like you threw me

so far from myself

i've been trying to find my way back ever since

-rupi kaur

i think i am so enamored with devotion as violence, because i want someone to love me even when i am covered in blood. most days, i am more teeth than lips. more claws than hands. more desperation than gentleness. if i am to love, i want it to consume me as surely as a forest fire. when the smoke has cleared, trees will grow stronger than before. i will only let my wounds be tended to by someone unafraid of gore, and i fear softness hurts more than any double edged sword. if i am to be loved, let it be in a slaughterhouse we might make into a home. then the heartache will be holy. and i will be whole.

mom, your child reads crime and punishment for fun