“Even in its first faint traces, love could alter a landscape. It wrote unimagined stories and made the most beautiful, forbidding places.”
―
Anna-Marie McLemore,
Wild Beauty
“This is was what their mothers would say if she and her cousins ever told them the things they folded inside their hearts. Twice as many paths to trouble, their mothers would whisper. As though their daughters loving both men and women meant they wanted all of them in the world. There was no way to tell their mothers the truth and make them believe it, that hearts that loved both boys and girls were no more reckless or easily won than any other heart. They loved who they loved. They broke how they broke. And the way it happened depended less on what was under their lovers' clothes and more on what was wrapped inside their spirits.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“To the boys who get called girls,the girls who get called boys,and those who live outside these words.To those called names,and those searching for names of their own.To those who live on the edges,and in the spaces in between.I wish for you every light in the sky.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“It shouldn't have mattered, not when Miel and the other girls in his class wore jeans more than they wore skirts. Not when they told their brothers what to do, and borrowed their fathers' books.But there was everything else. The idea of being called Miss or Ms. or worse, Mrs. The thought of being grouped in when someone called out 'girls' or 'ladies.' The endless, echoing use of 'she' and 'her,' 'miss' and 'ma'am.' Yes, they were words. They were all just words. But each of them was wrong, and they stuck to him. Each one was a golden fire ant, and they were biting his arms and his neck and his bound-flat chest, leaving him bleeding and burning.'He.' 'Him.' 'Mister.' 'Sir.' Even teachers admonishing him and his classmates with 'boys, settle down' or 'gentlemen, please.' These were sounds as perfect and clean as winter rain, and they calmed each searing bite of those wrong words.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The story of the ugly duckling was never about the cygnet discovering he is lovely. It is not a story about realizing you have become beautiful.It is about the sudden understanding that you are something other than what you thought you were, and that what you are is more beautiful than what you once thought you had to be.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Blanca & Roja
“When they both realized they were heartbroken enough to want the love torn from their rib cages, they touched each other with their hands and their mouths, and they forgot they wanted to be cured.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“He wore his loneliness like his scar.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, The Weight of Feathers
“I was a girl who would never exist in a fairy tale, not just because of the brown of my body but because of my heart, neither pure enough to be good nor cruel enough to be evil. I was a girl lost in the deep, narrow space between the two forms girls were allowed to take.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Blanca & Roja
“Of course he would think the whole glittering universe existed to spin anything he wanted out of stardust. He was a man, and a rich one, and these together made him believe the planets and moons orbited around the single point of his desires.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“Everyone is broken. The only difference is how.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“The difference between baptism and drowning is a few faithless breaths.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“...both he and she were creek beds, quiet when they were full and quiet when they were dry. But when they were half-full, wearing a coat of shallow water, the current bumped over the rocks and valleys in the creek beds, wearing down the earth. Giving someone else a little of who they were hurt more than giving up none or all of it.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The sense of falling did not touch her, not as long as her body was between the hands of this boy who felt steadier in the air than on the ground.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, The Weight of Feathers
“As though their daughters loving men and women meant they wanted all of them in the world. There was no way to tell their mothers the truth and make them believe it, that hearts that loved boys and girls were no more reckless or easily won than any other heart. They loved who they loved. They broke how they broke.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“The way he loved her was his, even if she wasn’t.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“No,' she whispered over those fields. 'No, you can't have this part of me.'If they tried to take Sam, she'd do anything she could to stop them, but that choice was his. This one was hers.'I am not your garden,' she said, the words no louder than the thread of her mother's voice the wind carried. 'I am not one of your pumpkin vines.''You do not own what I grow.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The truth slid over her skin, that if she loved him, sometimes it would mean doing nothing. It would mean being still. It would mean saying nothing, but standing close enough so he would know she was there, that she was staying.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The biggest lie of all is the story you think you already know.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Blanca & Roja
“No boy was ever so interesting to them as when he was interesting to someone else.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“This is was what their mothers would say if she and her cousins ever told them the things they folded inside their hearts. Twice as many paths to trouble, their mothers would whisper. As though their daughters loving both men and women meant they wanted all of them in the world. There was no way to tell their mothers the truth and make them believe it, that hearts that loved both boys and girls were no more reckless or easily won than any other heart. They loved who they loved. They broke how they broke. And the way it happened depended less on what was under their lovers' clothes and more on what was wrapped inside their spirits.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“To the boys who get called girls,the girls who get called boys,and those who live outside these words.To those called names,and those searching for names of their own.To those who live on the edges,and in the spaces in between.I wish for you every light in the sky.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“It shouldn't have mattered, not when Miel and the other girls in his class wore jeans more than they wore skirts. Not when they told their brothers what to do, and borrowed their fathers' books.But there was everything else. The idea of being called Miss or Ms. or worse, Mrs. The thought of being grouped in when someone called out 'girls' or 'ladies.' The endless, echoing use of 'she' and 'her,' 'miss' and 'ma'am.' Yes, they were words. They were all just words. But each of them was wrong, and they stuck to him. Each one was a golden fire ant, and they were biting his arms and his neck and his bound-flat chest, leaving him bleeding and burning.'He.' 'Him.' 'Mister.' 'Sir.' Even teachers admonishing him and his classmates with 'boys, settle down' or 'gentlemen, please.' These were sounds as perfect and clean as winter rain, and they calmed each searing bite of those wrong words.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The story of the ugly duckling was never about the cygnet discovering he is lovely. It is not a story about realizing you have become beautiful.It is about the sudden understanding that you are something other than what you thought you were, and that what you are is more beautiful than what you once thought you had to be.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Blanca & Roja
“When they both realized they were heartbroken enough to want the love torn from their rib cages, they touched each other with their hands and their mouths, and they forgot they wanted to be cured.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“He wore his loneliness like his scar.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, The Weight of Feathers
“I was a girl who would never exist in a fairy tale, not just because of the brown of my body but because of my heart, neither pure enough to be good nor cruel enough to be evil. I was a girl lost in the deep, narrow space between the two forms girls were allowed to take.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Blanca & Roja
“Of course he would think the whole glittering universe existed to spin anything he wanted out of stardust. He was a man, and a rich one, and these together made him believe the planets and moons orbited around the single point of his desires.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“Everyone is broken. The only difference is how.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“The difference between baptism and drowning is a few faithless breaths.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“...both he and she were creek beds, quiet when they were full and quiet when they were dry. But when they were half-full, wearing a coat of shallow water, the current bumped over the rocks and valleys in the creek beds, wearing down the earth. Giving someone else a little of who they were hurt more than giving up none or all of it.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The sense of falling did not touch her, not as long as her body was between the hands of this boy who felt steadier in the air than on the ground.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, The Weight of Feathers
“As though their daughters loving men and women meant they wanted all of them in the world. There was no way to tell their mothers the truth and make them believe it, that hearts that loved boys and girls were no more reckless or easily won than any other heart. They loved who they loved. They broke how they broke.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Wild Beauty
“The way he loved her was his, even if she wasn’t.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“No,' she whispered over those fields. 'No, you can't have this part of me.'If they tried to take Sam, she'd do anything she could to stop them, but that choice was his. This one was hers.'I am not your garden,' she said, the words no louder than the thread of her mother's voice the wind carried. 'I am not one of your pumpkin vines.''You do not own what I grow.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The truth slid over her skin, that if she loved him, sometimes it would mean doing nothing. It would mean being still. It would mean saying nothing, but standing close enough so he would know she was there, that she was staying.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
“The biggest lie of all is the story you think you already know.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, Blanca & Roja
“No boy was ever so interesting to them as when he was interesting to someone else.” ― Anna-Marie McLemore, When the Moon Was Ours
