Either a snail’s moist web of moonlight, or someone’s hot breath at four a.m. when the night has been too much, has eaten you whole.
This is my life.
It has been sifted through the bones of my body, through blood. It is all that I have.
—Joy Harjo
Happy birthday to me, from me.
Like this alabaster box whose art
Is frail as a cassia-flower, is my heart,
Carven with delicate dreams and wrought
With many a subtle and exquisite thought.
Therein I treasure the spice and scent
Of rich and passionate memories blent
Like odours of cinnamon, sandal, and clove,
Of song and sorrow and life and love.
—Sarojini Naidu
I was taught if we’re born with love then life is about choosing the right place to put it.
People talk about that a lot, feeling right, when it feels right it’s easy. But I’m not sure that’s true. It takes strength to know what’s right. And love isn’t something that weak people do. Being a romantic takes a hell of a lot of hope.
I think what they mean is, when you find somebody that you love, it feels like hope.
—The Priest, Fleabag
Learn to see, learn to hear, learn to feel, learn to smell, and know that by practice alone can you become expert.
Dr. William Osler
ten years come and gone / I soon run short of fingers / a decade, complete
Happy tenth birthday to La Pêche Fraîche, this little sliver of my soul.
We have reached double digits together, readers, and I humbly thank you.
Try not to resist the changes that come your way. Instead let life live through you.
And do not worry that your life is turning upside down.
How do you know that the side you are used to is better than the one to come?
—Rumi
Love is a journey with water and with stars,
with smothered air and squalls of flour:
love is a clash of lightning bolts
and two bodies defeated by a single drop of honey.
—Neruda, Love Sonnet XII
“Ha! hold my Brain; be still my beating Heart.”
—William Mountfort, Zelmane: Or, The Corinthian Queen: A Tragedy
Happy Valentine’s Day! You make my tart beet.
