Quotes by Warsan Shire

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

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

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

“Your daughter is ugly.She knows loss intimately,carries whole cities in her belly.As a child, relatives wouldnt hold her.She was splintered wood and sea water.They said she reminded them of the war...”

“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.”

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

“I want to make love, but my hair smells of war and running and running.”

“You are her mother.Why did you not warn her,hold her like a rotting boatand tell her that men will not love herif she is covered in continents,if her teeth are small colonies,if her stomach is an i...”

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

“It's not my responsibility to be beautiful. I'm not alive for that purpose. My existence is not about how desirable you find me.”

“Later that night she picked the polish offwith her front teeth until the bed you sharedfor seven years seemed speckled with glitterand blood.”

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

“Mother says there are locked rooms inside all women, kitchen of love, bedroom of grief, bathroom of apathy. Sometimes, the men, they come with keys, and sometimes the men, they come with hammers.”

“You tried to change didnt you? Closed your mouth more, tried to be softer, prettier, less volatile, less awake... You cant make homes out of human beings. Someone should have already told you that.”

“Sad people have the gift of time, while the world dizzies everyone else; they remain stagnant, their bodies refusing to follow pace with the universe. With these kind of people everything aches for...”

“Document the moments you feel most in love with yourself - what youre wearing, who youre around, what youre doing. Recreate and repeat.”

“The ego hurts you like this: you become obsessed with the one person who does not love you. blind to the rest who do.”

“The only darkness we should allow into our lives is the night, for even then, we have the moon.”

“later that night i held an atlas in my lap ran my fingers across the whole world and whispered where does it hurt?it answered everywhere everywhere everywhere.”

“No one leaves home unless homes is the mouth of a shark.”