I've never been free in my whole life. Inside I've always chased myself. I've become intolerable to myself. I live in a lacerating duality. I'm seemingly free, but I'm a prisoner inside of me.

Clarice Lispector, from A Breath of Life, 1978

Don’t Tell Your Uber Driver You’re Going to an Orgy, Donte Collins

The Secret History by Donna Tartt

Fly me to the moon

The Penitent Magdalen, oil on canvas, detail (1640)

Georges de La Tour

Pomegranates, Majorca by John Singer Sargent, 1908

- Beau Taplin

“One wants a room with no view so imagination can meet memory in the dark.”

— Annie Dillard, The Writing Life

"In my culture, we know death intimately. In Arabic, the highest expression of love is the phrase "ya'aburnee" Translated "you bury me" . It means "I love you so much, I'd sooner die than bury you". It was used by mothers in our lineage who were so used to losing their young in war. In my culture, we cannot talk about love without speaking death's name"

-George Abraham, "Untitled," Published In Black Napkin Press

I write. Obsessively. Because, when I write, there is purpose to my existence.

I read. Obsessively. Because, when I read, there is purpose to my loneliness.

when you’ve drifted to sleep next to them and they whisper “good night, my love” without knowing if you can hear them… that’s romance

I have two looks: a mysterious literary dark academic with a thing for blazers, poise, and blood, or Adam Sandler on Xanax, there is no in between

m’am, I’m an English Major. how else am I supposed to experience life? without metaphors? with no symbolism? cannot, will not stop intellectualizing. leave me be

Sue Zhao

Ocean Vuong, from “Dear Rose”, Time Is a Mother

Sylvia Plath, from The Unabridged Journals

[Text ID: “Here I am, a bundle of past recollections and future dreams, knotted up in a reasonably attractive bundle of flesh. I remember what this flesh has gone through; I dream of what it may go through.”]