—LAST YEAR WAS VERY COMPLICATED

 

 

100 Boyfriends—Brontez Purnell

 

 

--I have always been in the practice of being unnoticed.

 

--I don’t even recall an imaginary friend—it was just me.

 

--Sex is just light points on a grid, stars in the Milky Way, but really, the ether holding them all together is the waiting.

 

--Math is the most manipulated of all sciences, and memory is even shakier.

 

--It is always the small victories in life that speak power to truth.

 

--The world is a lot clearer without alcohol.

 

--I don’t know how to explain to him that I’m not just high on drugs. I AM DRUGS.

 

--Fresh from a blackout dream, I am a ghost, not afraid anymore.

 

--Just by themselves the words “true” and “love” are pretty sturdy concepts. Put together they can knock down any man who’s lonely enough to believe a lie as long as it’s said politely.

 

--“TRUE LOVE? DAMN! WHAT ABOUT ME, BITCH?

 

--This had been the same mistake I always made, that is, expecting more.

 

--What does love feel like? I’d imagine a rush, or, as a poet put it, “twenty million tom-toms.”

 

--Incoherence; the point where you are in the middle of making something and it no longer looks like art to you.

 

--I looked to my boyfriend for eye contact, because what else is a boyfriend for but to share in mutual epiphany?

 

--“You never stop looking like art to me.”

 

--Even an incoherent beat is still a beat.

 

--I love my bed because no one can hurt me here.

 

--The open window reminds me of that saying, “Where God closes a door, He opens a window,” but all I can think about is, like, But wait, the window is on the fifth floor and the house is on fire. To which the Almighty replies, “That’s just some GOD humor—good luck!

 

--I was too young to know that all men who want to extract something from you generally have the sweetest touch.

 

--It’s a short time to be here, and a long time to be gone.

—ONE MINUTE I HELD THE KEY, NEXT THE WALLS WERE CLOSED ON ME

How to Pronounce Knife—Souvankham Thammavongsa

 

 

--Red wondered what that felt like, to be seen, to feel the mouth of someone who wanted you.

 

--I wondered whether, in life, you get one big role, some message you need to deliver to someone, and when it’s done, it’s time to go.

 

--His laugh was gentle and private and welcoming. You got the sense that he, too, was alone.

 

--To know someone’s dislikes was to be close to them.

 

--You can do that with a joke, hide how you feel and mean what you say at the same time, and no one will ask you which it is.

 

--That’s what it felt like then, to be with Richard. I didn’t think about what would happen to me, what the future would look like. I was in it.

 

--I watched him with a sadness he couldn’t see. I didn’t want to be with someone who could do that—who could deny what I was. He had the time to have regrets, to be stupid. I didn’t.

 

--That’s the thing about being old. We don’t have wrinkles until we see them. Old is a thing that happens on the outside. A thing other people see about us.

 

--All they could know was to be close to it, and remain out of sight.

 

--No one is ever alone in the world. There is always a friend somewhere for everyone.

 

--Beauty was boring. To be ugly was to be particular, memorable, unforgettable even.

 

--It was the way it was. We lose each other, or the way we know each other gets lost.

 

--Sometimes people have a way of looking at you that makes you feel you have to explain yourself.

 

--I wanted to know what it would feel like to have a sound like that in my mouth.

 

--Tell me you love me. Even if not’s true. Say it, just say it.

 

--Every piece belongs somewhere, doesn’t it?

 

—THE NEON LIGHTS ON BALTIMORE, EVERY SHADOW’S GETTING FAMOUS

 

 

How to Pronounce Knife—Souvankham Thammavongsa

 

 

--Red wondered what that felt like, to be seen, to feel the mouth of someone who wanted you.

 

--I wondered whether, in life, you get one big role, some message you need to deliver to someone, and when it’s done, it’s time to go.

 

--His laugh was gentle and private and welcoming. You got the sense that he, too, was alone.

 

--To know someone’s dislikes was to be close to them.

 

--You can do that with a joke, hide how you feel and mean what you say at the same time, and no one will ask you which it is.

 

--That’s what it felt like then, to be with Richard. I didn’t think about what would happen to me, what the future would look like. I was in it.

 

--I watched him with a sadness he couldn’t see. I didn’t want to be with someone who could do that—who could deny what I was. He had the time to have regrets, to be stupid. I didn’t.

 

--That’s the thing about being old. We don’t have wrinkles until we see them. Old is a thing that happens on the outside. A thing other people see about us.

 

--All they could now was to be close to it, and remain out of sight.

 

--No one is ever alone in the world. There is always a friend somewhere for everyone.

 

--Beauty was boring. To be ugly was to be particular, memorable, unforgettable even.

 

--It was the way it was. We lose each other, or the way we know each other gets lost.

 

--Sometimes people have a way of looking at you that makes you feel you have to explain yourself.

 

--I wanted to know what it would feel like to have a sound like that in my mouth.

 

--Tell me you love me. Even if not’s true. Just say it, please.

 

--Every piece belongs somewhere, doesn’t it?

 

—YOUR LIPS, MY LIPS, APOCALYPSE

 

 

…Last week I read 12 books, the bulk of which were stellar. One, The Midnight Library, by Matt Haig annoyed the hell out of me throughout much of the see-saw story, but when I’d finished I noticed I had dogeared an unusual amount of pages.

So, here are some of my favorite bits…

 

--It’s hard to predict, isn’t it? The things that will make us happy.

 

--Where there were books, there was always the temptation to open them. And she realized it was the same with lives.

 

--He was a good person, and good people were rare.

 

--She learned that undoing regrets was really a way of making wishes come true.

 

--There had, in short, been a lot of lives. And among those lives she had laughed and cried and felt calm and terrified and everything in between.

 

--“I’m sorry,” his other self said. “I’ve forgotten who you are.”

--“Don’t worry,” she said. “So have I.”

 

--So long as there are still books on shelves, you are never trapped. Every book is a potential escape.

 

--Kindness is a strong force. And rare.

 

--We only know what we perceive. Everything we experience is ultimately just our perception of it.

 

--You don’t have to understand life. You just have to live it.

 

--“I have had many lives.”

--“Great. Is there one where you kiss me again?”

 

--The only way to learn is to live.

 

--Never underestimate the big importance of small things.

 

--You keep your eye on the queen, and the knights, and the bishop, because they are the sneaky ones. But it’s the rook that often gets you. The straightforward is never quite what it seems.

 

--You can choose choices but not outcomes.

 

--You see, doing one thing differently is very often the same as doing everything differently.

 

--I think it is easy to imagine there are easier paths. But maybe there are no easy paths. Maybe there are just paths.

 

--We spend so much time wishing our lives were different, comparing ourselves to other people and to other versions of ourselves, when really most lives contain degrees of good and degrees of bad.

 

--Who needs a door when you have a book?

 

--Some things are just impossible to see.

 

--It’s a possibility that we are reaching the end of possibility.

 

--It would have made things a lot easier if we understood there was no way of living that can immunize you against sadness. And that sadness is intrinsically part of the fabric of happiness You can’t have one without the other.

There is no life where you can be in a state of happiness forever. And imagining there is just breeds more unhappiness in the life you’re in.

 

--You are the library card.

 

--Because a pawn is never just a pawn. A pawn is a queen-in-waiting. All you need to do is find a way to keep moving forward.

 

--The thing that looks most ordinary might end up being the very thing that leads you to victory.

 

--If something is happening to me, I want to be there.

 

--She was a waterfall of despair.

 

--You get near a black hole and the gravitational pull drags you into the bleak, dark reality.

 

--She went on Instagram and saw everyone had worked out how to live, except her.

 

--Will my life be miraculously free from pain, despair, grief, heartbreak, hardship, loneliness, depression? No. But do I want to live? Yes. Yes. A thousand times, yes.  

 

--Well, that’s the beauty, isn’t it? You just never know how it ends.

 

 

 —NO LYING, BUT SOMETIMES THE TRUTH DON’T SOUND LIKE THE TRUTH, MAYBE CAUSE IT AIN’T

 

Mustard Seed Days

 

I saw Stevie Nicks 

running down my driveway, 

tail wagging like a metronome. 

The bedpost was farther ahead, 

on fire, the wood wailing 

like a witch in heat. 

I’m not making this up.

In the bathtub swam 

a raft of otters. 

A coalition of Cheetahs

tore down the hall, 

faster than the wind. 

You called me delusional, 

but I subbed that out for romantic, 

shampooed your hair in the sink 

while staring through the window as 

a bloat of hippos slow-danced in the rain. 

--OH, THE CANVAS CAN DO MIRACLES, JUST YOU WAIT AND SEE