No Matter the Wreckage Quotes

“Forgive yourself for the decisions you have made, the ones you still call mistakes when you tuck them in at night”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Is there a word for the moment you win tug-of-war? When the weight gives, and all that extra rope comes hurtling towards you, how even though you've won, you still end up with muddy knees and burns on your hands? Is there a word for that? I wish there was.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“My world was the size of a crayon box, and it took every colour to draw her”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“I will love you with too many commas,
but never any asterisks.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Oh, Brother. No matter your wreckage. There will be someone to find you beautiful, despite the cruddy metal. Your ruin is not to be hidden behind paint and canvas. Let them see the cracks.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage

“How strange, that when you are away, I reach for my cell phone's buzz as if it were your hand. Each shiver in my pocket, a way to find you.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Some nights, I wake up knowing he is anxious. He is across the world in another woman's arms and the years have spread us like dandelion seeds, sanding down the edges of our jigsaw parts that used to only fit each other”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“I promise to tidy up before company arrives, wouldn't want my socks and daydreams all over the carpet”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“There was no secret I did not tell him, there was no moment we did not share. We didn't grow up, we grew in; like ivy wrapping, molding each other into perfect yins and yangs”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“We both know how to hide our sharpest parts, I just don’t always recognize my own weaponry.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage

“Hands learn. More than minds do.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“You can only fit so many words into a postcard.
Only so many in a phone call.
Only so many into space, before you forget that words are sometimes used for things other than filling emptiness.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“There are so many things I would tell you
if I thought that you would listen
and so many more you would tell me
if you believed I would understand”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“She makes tea by hand. Nettles, slippery elm, turmeric, cinnamon - my mother is a recipe for warm throats and belly laughs. Once she fell off a ladder when I was three. She says all she was worried about was my face as I watched her fall.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“And I know we live in different worlds, and we're always really busy, but in my dreams you spin around me so fast, I always wake up dizzy.

So maybe one day you'll grow tired of the road and roll on back to me.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Practice does not make perfect. Practice makes permanent. Repeat the same mistakes over and over, and you don't get any closer to Carnegie Hall.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Fingers interlocked like a beautiful accordion of flesh or a zipper of prayer”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“If loving you means getting dirty, bring on the grime.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“We were dandelion seeds released to the wind, she asked for no return. We are saplings now. With gentle hands.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“When I meet you, in that moment, I am no longer a part of your future. I start quickly becoming part of your past. But in that instant, I get to share a part of your present. And you get to share a part of mine. And that is the greatest present of all.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Whenever I hurt myself, my mother says
it is the universe’s way of telling me to
slow down. She also tells me to put some
coconut oil on it. It doesn’t matter what it
is. She often hides stones underneath my
pillow when I come home for the weekend.
The stones are a formula for sweet dreams
and clarity. I dig them out from the streets,
she tells me what each one is for. My throat
hurts, so she grinds black pepper into a
spoonful of honey, makes me eat the entire
thing. My mother knows how to tie knots
like a ship captain, but doesn’t know how
I got that sailor mouth. She falls asleep
in front of the TV only until I turn it off,
shouts, I was watching that! The sourdough
she bakes on Friday is older than I am.
She sneaks it back and forth across the country
when she flies by putting the starter in small
containers next to a bag of carrots.
They think it’s ranch dressing, she giggles.
She makes tea by hand. Nettles, slippery elm,
turmeric, cinnamon- my mother is a recipe
for warm throats and belly laughs. Once
she fell off of a ladder when I was three.
She says all she was worried about was
my face as I watched her fall.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Our model ships look perfect in their bottles, but we do not know if they are seaworthy. Sometimes the one that reaches your harbor has already been through the storm.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage

“I didn't tell him that even after a crash, a key still fits the ignition. There just isn't anything left to drive.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Getting the wind knocked out of you is the only way to remind your lungs how much they like the taste of air.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“It does not matter how long we have been kept in cages. It does not matter how strong your gravity is. We were always meant to fly.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“I will wake you up early
even though I know you like to stay through the credits.

I will leave pennies in your pockets,
postage stamps of superheroes
in between the pages of your books,
sugar packets on your kitchen counter.
I will Hansel and Gretel you home.

I talk through movies.
Even ones I have never seen before.

I will love you with too many commas,
but never any asterisks.

There will be more sweat than you are used to.
More skin.
More words than are necessary.

My hair in the shower drain,
my smell on your sweaters,
bobby pins all over the window sills.

I make the best sandwiches you've ever tasted.
You'll be in charge of napkins.

I can't do a pull-up.
But I'm great at excuses.

I count broken umbrellas after every thunderstorm,
and I fall asleep repeating the words thank you.

I will wake you up early
with my heavy heartbeat.
You will say, Can't we just sleep in, and I will say,
No, trust me. You don't want to miss a thing.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“Her dress is the colour of marmalade, she chirps songs that have no words”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“...I was not born with enough fuel. My anger
often melts into sadness, it will just
disintegrate into shame or fear, my
clenched teeth release into chatter.
But you have found the right mix of
arrogance and alcohol. Place your hands
on me one more time, then again, exhale
the cigarette into my eyes, tell me again
how I’m just not understanding the point,
remind me how you are an expert, touch
my knee, my thigh, my lower back, ignore
me twice, three times, continue talking over
me with the man to my right. There is a
beast in my veins that was birthed by my
father. It is quiet, it sleeps through most
nights. Tonight, sir, my tail twitches in
the darkest caves. Be careful, darling.
Your footsteps land heavy here. Your
racket will wake the dragons.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“I am watching parts of me evaporate like sidewalk water. This wet grey, this nighttime dew, gone before morning.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage: Poems

“We build model ships in bottles, whispering life into the toothpicks and wire; we make plans and blueprints for the one we hope is coming. And come they do. Fleets of vessels. Battleships and barges. They arrive on the horizon, flags to the sky.”
― Sarah Kay, No Matter the Wreckage