Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one has just contradicted oneself.’

— Graham Priest, Beyond the Limits of Thought

A billowy cloudiness of flesh at a wound-point in water.

‘Complication, tension, imbalance, selfishness: these are not just obstacles within the work-of-two, but central to its potential.’

—  Season Butler

‘Forgive me. Sometimes the Lord needs dirty workers 😉 ‘

— Shuhuda Sadaqat

‘The poem can be conceived as an object between poet and reader which is both a means of communication and a barrier to communication.’

— Peter Riley, ‘The Creative Moment of the Poem’

Articles 12–14 of the 1805 Haitian constitution. ’12: No whiteman of whatever nation he may be, shall put his foot on this territory with the title of master or proprietor, neither shall he in future acquire any property therein. 13: The preceding article cannot in the smallest degree affect white woman who have been naturalized Haytians by Government, nor does it extend to children already born, or that may be born of the said women. The Germans and Polanders naturalized by government are also comprized in the dispositions of the present article. 14: All acception of colour among the children of one and the same family, of whom the chief magistrate is the father, being necessarily to cease, the Haytians shall hence forward be known only by the generic appellation of Blacks.’

‘Just because you’ve written a book about something doesn’t mean you’re done thinking about it.’

— Ursula Le Guin.

‘There’s nothing so terrible that people can’t get used to it. Some may even come to miss it when it’s gone.’

— Michael Cisco, ‘Oneiropaths’

‘The Kasai Company had a lucrative relationship with the African people. For minimal sums it bought their raw products and services and then it recovered even those small sums by selling the people articles for which they had acquired a taste while working for the white man. This is commonly known as “the civilizing mission,” and is particularly successful when associated with a culture that teaches shame for a people’s original tastes. Disseminating at the same time religious dictums about poverty and humility does not distract from this useful principle.’ — Andrée Blouin, My Country, Africa

‘Words fall short, yes, but sometimes their shadows can reach the unspeakable.’

— Yiyun Li, Where Reasons End.