Quote

Do we simply stare at what is horrible and forgive it?

Richard Siken

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Richard Siken
Age: 57
Born: 1967
Born: February 15
Poet
New York City
New York
Simply
Stare
Staring
Forgive
Forgiving
Horrible

More quotes by Richard Siken

Image
I swear, I end up feeling empty, like you've taken something out of me and I have to search my body for scars.
Richard Siken
Image
Fairy tales have rules. You are a princess or you aren’t. You are pure at heart or you aren’t. If you are pure at heart, or lucky, you might catch a break.
Richard Siken
Image
We have not touched the stars, nor are we forgiven, which brings us back to the hero’s shoulders and the gentleness that comes, not from the absence of violence, but despite the abundance of it.
Richard Siken
Image
I woke up in the morning and I didn’t want anything, didn’t do anything, couldn’t do it anyway, just lay there listening to the blood rush through me and it never made any sense, anything.
Richard Siken
Image
I sleep. I dream. I make up things that I would never say. I say them very quietly.
Richard Siken
Image
I am singing now while Rome burns.
Richard Siken
Image
The light is no mystery, the mystery is that there is something to keep the light from passing through.
Richard Siken
Image
We can do anything. It’s not because our hearts are large, they’re not, it’s what we struggle with. The attempt to say Come over. Bring your friends. It’s a potluck, I’m making pork chops, I’m making those long noodles you love so much.
Richard Siken
Image
Sometimes you get so close to someone you end up on the other side of them.
Richard Siken
Image
You see, I take the parts that I remember and stitch them back together to make a creature that will do what I say or love me back.
Richard Siken
Image
Here I am leaving you clues. I am singing now while Rome burns. We are all just trying to be holy. My applejack, my silent night, just mash your lips against me. We are all going forward. None of us are going back.
Richard Siken
Image
You’re falling now. You’re swimming. This is not           harmless. You are not                     breathing.
Richard Siken
Image
I don't know where I end and the world begins. My best guess? Skin. It's the only actual boundary between the body and the world, between a body and any other body.
Richard Siken
Image
Here I am in a rabbit run, here I am in a valley of pine, waiting for you to find me. I could pretend I’m speaking to everyone—assume a middle distance and transcend myself—but I’m taking to you and you know it.
Richard Siken
Image
I'm bleeding, I'm not just making conversation.
Richard Siken
Image
You wanted happiness, I can’t blame you for that, and maybe a mouth sounds idiotic when it blathers on about joy but tell me you love this, tell me you’re not miserable.
Richard Siken
Image
Tell me about the dream where we pull the bodies out of the lake and dress them in warm clothes again.
Richard Siken
Image
We laugh & it pits the world against us.
Richard Siken
Image
Sorry about the blood in your mouth. I wish it was mine. I couldn't get the boy to kill me, but I wore his jacket for the longest time.
Richard Siken
Image
You are playing cards with three Jeffs. One is your father, one is your brother, and the other is your current boyfriend. All of them have seen you naked and heard you talking in your sleep. Your boyfriend Jeff gets up to answer the phone. To them he is a mirror, but to you he is a room.
Richard Siken