Nayyirah Quotes & Sayings

If we must
both
be right.
we will
lose
each other. — Nayyirah Waheed

water clings to my wrists. it has been my fragrance since birth. — Nayyirah Waheed

i have never understood.
will
probably never understand.
the white mans lust
to eat the world.
to eat the universe. (mars is next)
why he was born with such a rabid
starvation.
why he feigns for power
like
crack rock. doing everything. and anything.
to have it.
no matter how deranged.
why he is in so much pain
he needs to rip the roots of happiness
from the earth
and
burn them into
his smile.
what happened in his relationship with our mother.
that he needs to set a person on fire.
watch them burn.
to
feel powerful.
not every white man
is
born this way,
but,
it stands to remain
there are many
who
are. — Nayyirah Waheed

i am such a sensitive summer thing. — Nayyirah Waheed

I knew you
before
i met you.
i've known you my whole life. — Nayyirah Waheed

If you deserve
honey
mine will flow from my arms to
yours
no effort, no asking.
but, if there is none
and
you feel wind instead.
know
that my spirit already
senses that
when you smell sweetness
you
begin harvesting blades in your
hands.
- kindness is a form of intelligence — Nayyirah Waheed

Do not choose the lesser life. do you hear me. do you hear me. choose the life that is. yours. the life that is seducing your lungs. that is dripping down your chin. — Nayyirah Waheed

When you meet that person. a person. one of your soulmates. let the connection. relationship be what it is. it may be five mins. five hours. five days. five months. five years. a lifetime. let it manifest itself, the way it is meant to. it has an organic destiny. this way if it stays or if it leaves, you will be softer from having been loved this authentically. souls come into, return, open, and sweep through your life for a myriad of reasons, let them be who and what they are meant. — Nayyirah Waheed

Just because someone desires you, it does not mean that they value you.
Read it over.
Again.
Let those words resonate in your mind. — Nayyirah Waheed

Even the small poems mean something. they are often whales in the bodies of tiny fish. — Nayyirah Waheed

my mother gave me islam.

my father gave me the god of absence.

and here i am.

a religion made of myself. — Nayyirah Waheed

Be easy. take your time. you are coming home. to yourself. - the becoming — Nayyirah Waheed

I am your friend. a soul for your soul. a place for your life. home. know this. sun or water. here or away. we are a lighthouse. we leave. and we stay. — Nayyirah Waheed

she was a beautiful place to bare my legs. — Nayyirah Waheed

the hard season will split you through. do not worry. you will bleed water. — Nayyirah Waheed

I will always be a translation. — Nayyirah Waheed

Grieve. so that you can be free to feel something else. — Nayyirah Waheed

I do not expect my child's respect.
just because i have given birth to their life.
does not mean they owe me.
anything.
what i want most
is to look into my child's eyes
and
see
that i have given birth
to
a
heart.
have
honored.
held and feed.
someones
heart.
from the moment we first met.
and
they love me for it. — Nayyirah Waheed

i have always been the woman of my dreams. — Nayyirah Waheed

i am a silk field of vulnerability. — Nayyirah Waheed

Does he not remember he is half woman. — Nayyirah Waheed

we are never our own.
we must change this fact.

- acceptance — Nayyirah Waheed

you and the poems have a lot to talk about. — Nayyirah Waheed

all the women. in me. are tired. — Nayyirah Waheed

You
not wanting me
was
the beginning of me
wanting myself
thank you — Nayyirah Waheed

there is no healthier drug than creativity. — Nayyirah Waheed

you ask your heart why it is always hurting. it says 'this is the only thing you will allow me to say to you. the only feeling you are willing to feel. — Nayyirah Waheed

Desire is the kind of thing that
eats you
and
leaves you starving. — Nayyirah Waheed

I don't pay attention to the
world Ending.
It has ended for me
many Times
and began again in the morning. — Nayyirah Waheed

i have lost millions and millions
of words to fear.
tell me that is not violence.

- the deaths — Nayyirah Waheed

Listen to my poems
but do not look for me
look for you. — Nayyirah Waheed

You are a story. do not become a word. one word. because you want to be loved. love does not ask you to be nothing for something. — Nayyirah Waheed

she asked 'you are in love what does love look like' to which i replied 'like everything i've ever lost come back to me. — Nayyirah Waheed

i learned shukran. (thank you) first. shukran. (thank you) for this meal. shukran. (thank you) for making this for me. shukran. for everything. and in the midst of all of this. gratitude. la. (no) was lost. before. i ever found it. - the blunt force of gratitude — Nayyirah Waheed

The thing you are most
afraid to write
Write that. — Nayyirah Waheed

length of our love. she was your eyes the day i met you. remember, you and i. — Nayyirah Waheed

Chemistry is you touching my arm and it setting fire to my mind
Nayyirah Waheed — Nayyirah Waheed

A lie
is
simply a lie.
it draws its strength from belief.
stop believing
in
what hurts you.
- power — Nayyirah Waheed

i will. and this will end. - closure | dankyes — Nayyirah Waheed

I am so full of my tongue you would think speaking is easy. but it is not. — Nayyirah Waheed

you are not a mistake. you are too many exquisite details to be a mistake. — Nayyirah Waheed

Whether with a lover or none. i reek of love. i stink of love. — Nayyirah Waheed

I will tell you, my daughter of your worth not your beauty every day. — Nayyirah Waheed

I am a black wave in a white sea. always seen and unseen. — Nayyirah Waheed

you see how your body is beginning to slow glow with stars. you are remembering. you are mine. you have never been anything else. — Nayyirah Waheed

decolonization requires acknowledging. that your needs and desires should never come at the expense of another's life energy. it is being honest that you have been spoiled by a machine that is not feeding you freedom but feeding you the milk of pain. — Nayyirah Waheed

i know, she is the love you are, the land you are made of, and she is hemorrhaging. war is eating her heart. — Nayyirah Waheed

creativity keeps the world alive, yet, everyday we are asked to be ashamed of honoring it, wanting to live our lives as artists. i've carried the shame of being a 'creative' since i came to the planet; have been asked to be something different, more, less my whole life. thank spirit, my wisdom is deeper than my shame, and i listened to who i was. i want to say to all the creatives who have been taught to believe who you are is not enough for this world, taught that a life of art will amount to nothing, know that who we are, and what we do is life. when we create, we are creating the world. remember this, and commit. — Nayyirah Waheed

the poem.
the one that is running through
your life.
pay attention.
to that poem. — Nayyirah Waheed

the first time the caregiver saw it on the child. they said 'no. don't you dare. you will not grow up thinking you are unwanted. because your parents. chose themselves. over you. this will not be your story because it is not the truth. the truth. is your creation is not about them. you came through them, my love, they were your vessel. the truth. is you were born for you. you were wanted by you. you came for you. you are here for you. your existence is yours. yes. you will want them. (and on odd and warm nights they will think of you and hold themselves tighter.) but. what you do not get. from them. does not make you less. does not make you unwanted. (trust that all you did not receive. all you need. will come to you. in time. the universe is infinite.') - a love poem — Nayyirah Waheed

It is being honest
about
my pain
that
makes me invincible. — Nayyirah Waheed

I want to live so densely. lush. and slow in the next few years, that a year becomes ten years, and my past becomes only a page in the book of my life. — Nayyirah Waheed

the cure for apathy is memory. — Nayyirah Waheed

Someone can be madly in love with you and still not be ready. They can love you in a way you have never been loved and still not join you on the bridge. And whatever their reasons you must leave. Because you never ever have to inspire anyone to meet you on the bridge. You never ever have to convince someone to do the work to be ready. There is more extraordinary love, more love that you have never seen, out here in this wide and wild universe. And there is the love that will be ready. — Nayyirah Waheed

No'
might make them angry
but
it will make
you
free. — Nayyirah Waheed

I am a soft revolution. the one whose hair is bleeding. — Nayyirah Waheed

I will be lost and unlost, over
and over again, relax love. You
were meant to be this glorious.
Epic. Story. — Nayyirah Waheed

Remember,
you were a writer
before
you ever
put
pen to paper.
just because you were not writing
externally.
does not mean you were not writing
internally. — Nayyirah Waheed

You are a flood in my hands. — Nayyirah Waheed

can you be a daughter.
if you have no
mother language."
- african american iii — Nayyirah Waheed

your skin smells like light. i think you are the moon. — Nayyirah Waheed

You travel to lush looted countries. parts of earth laying on their sides. barely breathing. hot with rust, infection, and tourist anemia. you and your camera arrive. start tearing at bodies with your lust. it's harmless. appreciating culture. sharing. honoring clothing. the way certain skin exists. — Nayyirah Waheed

Can we speak in flowers.
it will be easier for me to understand. — Nayyirah Waheed

i am a brutally soft woman. — Nayyirah Waheed

Sometimes i want to say it. and there is nothing in english. that will say it. — Nayyirah Waheed

If someone does not want me it is not the end of the world. But if I do not want me, the world is nothing but endings. — Nayyirah Waheed

As a writer, if someone falls in love with my work, I know they have fallen in love with my mind. Having no idea what my face looks like, they chose my mind. Art may be the only place a woman can be whole without being seen. — Nayyirah Waheed

Never
trust anyone
who says
they do not see color.
this means
to them,
you are invisible. — Nayyirah Waheed

There have been so many times
i have seen a man wanting to weep
but
instead
beat his heart until it was unconscious. — Nayyirah Waheed

There is a god in writing.
a soft. roaring. unconditional.
home of a god.
who prays to me. — Nayyirah Waheed

Would
you still want to travel to
that
country
if
you could not take a camera with you.
-a question of appropriation — Nayyirah Waheed

I want to keep our body above water. you want to make us a fish. - fish — Nayyirah Waheed

We
softened. and broke. and kneeled over in pain. and sang. and threw ourselves against the walls. against each other. and hid. and caved. and opened. and tossed ourselves into work. and danced. and shrank. and closed. and ate. and bled. and held on. and ignored. and accepted. and lied. and laughed. and created. and undid. and drank. and drugged. and loved something. someone. somewhere. ourselves. fiercer. and hated. something. someone. somewhere. fiercer. and swam. and rejected. and yearned. and distanced. and clawed. and touched. and some of us will disown you. because you hurt too much. some of us will have to say your name for a year. before we are able to sleep. — Nayyirah Waheed

The truth is
you were born for you.
you were wanted by you.
you came for you.
you are here for you.
your existence is yours.
yes. — Nayyirah Waheed

They take no from our first breath. go back and return it to your mouth. your heart. your light. — Nayyirah Waheed

i am mine.
before i am ever anyone else's. — Nayyirah Waheed

And i heard her say, 'you
are afraid of love. but
love is not afraid of you. — Nayyirah Waheed

sometimes i smell my parents on my words. and i weep. — Nayyirah Waheed

Poetry alters my dna. every poem is a different life. every poem brings me closer to myself. and breaks open a new future inside of me. — Nayyirah Waheed

We are houses eaten by rivers because we do not know their smell. — Nayyirah Waheed

I loved you
because
it was easier
than
loving myself. — Nayyirah Waheed

Sometimes the night wakes in the middle of me. and i can do nothing but become the moon. — Nayyirah Waheed

i cannot see you anymore. your smile. your legs. your heat. is lonely. the honey, grandmother said, is for your blood. it is to bring you back. — Nayyirah Waheed

Your soul stained my shoulders. my whole life smells like you. this will take time. undoing you from my blood. — Nayyirah Waheed

If
the ocean
can calm itself,
so can you.
we
are both
salt water
mixed with
air. — Nayyirah Waheed

When I am afraid to speak is when I speak.
That is when it is most important. — Nayyirah Waheed

as a woman i know the difference between appreciation and teeth. what really hurts is that as a girl i had to know the same thing. — Nayyirah Waheed

poetry.
is the fire leaving my body. — Nayyirah Waheed

My english is broken.
on purpose.
you
have to try harder to understand
me.
breaking this language
you so love
is my pleasure.
in your arrogance
you presume that i want your
skinny language.
that my mouth is building
a room for
it
in the back of my throat.
it is not.
i have seven different words for love. you have only one. that makes a lot of sense — Nayyirah Waheed

leaving. doesn't mean that you've left. — Nayyirah Waheed

apologize to your body.
maybe,
that's where the healing
begins. — Nayyirah Waheed

trust your work. — Nayyirah Waheed

when,' is not something you ask someone when the bodies of their aunt. uncle. friends. first love. cannot be found. — Nayyirah Waheed

Some words build houses in your throat. and they live there, content and on fire. — Nayyirah Waheed

I love myself.'
the
quietest.
simplest.
most
powerful.
revolution.
ever. — Nayyirah Waheed

will never know my skin. wild with everything and nothing but them. i sang into their blood. each and every one of them have my voices in their bones. — Nayyirah Waheed

What we hide and do not say turns into another mouth that only we know. — Nayyirah Waheed

a poem can eat a person whole. for years. — Nayyirah Waheed

I lost a whole continent.
a whole continent from my memory.
unlike all other hyphenated americans
my hyphen is made of blood.
when africa says hello
my mouth is a heartbreak
because i have nothing in my tongue
to answer her.
i don't know how to say hello to my mother. — Nayyirah Waheed

go.
enjoy.
leave.
it was all about you, anyway. — Nayyirah Waheed