i'll do as much as these old bones will allow.

When I was alive, I aimed to be a student not of longing but of light.
— Maggie Nelson, Bluets

War in heaven
And the damage is ours. The birds come to feed
On what is left.
— Brigit Pegeen Kelly, 'The White Pilgrim: Old Christian Cemetery'

How well you understand there is no loss like looking back on the city you loved as even now you are leaving it. How well you understand
that fathoming the past is another miraculous way
of lacing fingers with the sea.
— Jane Springer, 'Sleeping With the Excavator'

The way to hold on is afterwords so clear.
— Anne Carson, 'New Rule'