Today, in front of a slew of white authors, during a fellowship, with a drink in my hand, I said that I was untouchable. There was a gasp, and maybe it was a hundred years of work for my name to arrive here, where I can name my pain so well that people are afraid of the consequences and the power.

I wondered if he thought this was a real emergency or another dramatic thing—I am constantly in some panic or despair, it seems. I worried more than I could breathe.Mailhot, Terese Marie. Heart Berries: A Memoir (p. 106). Counterpoint. Kindle Edition.

Nothing is too ugly for this world, I think. It’s just that people pretend not to see.

Pain expanded my heart.

My people cultivated pain. In a way that god cultivated his garden with the foresight that he could not contain or protect the life within it. Humanity was born out of pain.

When you told me that I want too much, I considered how much you take.

Each child, woman, and man should know a limit of containment. Nobody should be asked to hold more.

Romanticism requires bravery and risk.

I didn't know if what I felt was authenticity, or a disease that would overtake me.

You are such a home to me.