184 Quotes by Maggie Nelson

She is trying to get me to see that although I thought I loved this man very completely for exactly who he was, I was in fact blind to the man he actually was, or is.

But the tacit undercurrent of her argument, as I felt it, was that Gallop’s maternity had rotted her mind – besotted it with the narcissism that makes one think that an utterly ordinary experience shared by countless others is somehow unique, or uniquely interesting.

229. I am writing all this down in blue ink, so as to remember that all words, not just some, are written in water.

I have heard that this pain can be converted, as it were, by accepting “the fundamental impermanence of all things.” This acceptance bewilders me: sometimes it seems an act of will; at others, of surrender.

While the two words often arrive sutured together, I think it worthwhile to breathe some space between them, so that one might see “brutal honesty” not as a more forceful version of honesty itself, but as one possible use of honesty. One that doesn’t necessarily lay truth barer by dint of force, but that actually overlays something on top of it – something that can get in its way. That something is cruelty.

Though lovers be lost love shall not”, etc. But I am not yet sure how to sever the love from the lover without occasioning some degree of carnage.

102. After my friend’s accident I take care of her. It is always taking care, but it is difficult, because at times to take care of her is also to cause her pain.

The problem is, of course, that art typically requires an audience, which loops us right back to the problem of observing actions and losing ourselves in consideration of their imagined form.

I was so happy renting in New York City for so long because renting – or at least the way I rented, which involved never lifting a finger to better my surroundings – allows you to let things literally fall apart all around you. Then, when it gets to be too much, you just move on.