Chelcie Rowell

“The mind roams more widely in the dark than it does in light. It is no surprise, then, stepping out of the unlit house into the unlit compound to find myself with the sudden thought, What if I inhabited another body and had a different destiny? We have all had these notions, perhaps while standing on a porch over a lake in the summer night as our friends enjoy a party indoors, or maybe on waking alone at three in the morning. Moments of great isolation. And there is that other thought: What if everything changed tonight? What if there is an explosion in the generator house? Nighted color seeps into the mind.”
― Teju Cole, Every Day is for the Thief

“This is what it is to be a stranger: when you leave, there is no void.”
― Teju Cole, Every Day is for the Thief

“I look at his hands. In those hands is new knowledge.”
― Teju Cole, Every Day is for the Thief

“But the past continues to gather around like floodwater. A too easy formulation, but what past do I have in mind? The nation’s, I think. But perhaps I am also thinking of mine, perhaps the two are connected, the way a small segment of a coastline is formed with the same logic that makes the shape of the continental shelf.”
― Teju Cole, Every Day is for the Thief