Annoying As Fuck

Grief settles comfortably into any host; it is an ever-mutating, vigorous organism with an ever-renewing customer base. It generates a never-ending hunger, a never-ending ache, an unassuageable pain to new hearts, brains, guts every minute, every day, every year.It is the razor edge of a loose tooth shrieking to be pressed again and again into the soft pink sore gum. It’s a one-way tunnel with no proof of another exit.

'Wildlife' by Fiona Wood 

'You know what they say about mistakes though,' she said, all breathy and half-lipsy. 'It's the only way you ever learn anything.' And she leant forward and kissed him. Right there, in the middle of the bar. Right there, in the middle of his lips.

'Beatle Meets Destiny' by Gabrielle Williams

When you are a kid you have your own language, and unlike French or Spanish or whatever you start learning in fourth grade, this one you're born with, and eventually lose. Everyone under the age of seven is fluent in 'ifspeak'; go hang around with someone under three feet tall and you'll see. What if a giant funnelweb spider crawled out of that hole over your head and bit you on the neck? What if the only antidote for venom was locked up in a vault on the top of a mountain? What if you lived through the bite, but could only move your eyelids and blink the alphabet? It doesn't really matter how far you go; the point is that it's a world of possibility. Kids think with their brains cracked wide open; becoming an adult, I've decided, is only a slow sewing shut.

'My sister's Keeper' Jodi Picoult 

You'll find that you're not the first person who was ever confused and frightened and even sickened by human behaviour. You're by no means alone on that score, you'll be excited and stimulated to know. Many, many men have been just as troubled morally and spiritually as you are right now. Happily, some of them kept records of their troubles. You'll learn from them — if you want to. Just as someday, if you have something to offer, someone will learn something from you. It's a beautiful reciprocal arrangement. And it isn't education. It's history. It's poetry.

'The Catcher in the Rye' by J.D. Salinger

The statesman's pocket my new cage, he called me a spectre then stole my dialect to wrench the core of men, made me the Braille, dots beneath skin, of a blindman's game.

'The Possibility of Flight' by Lia Hills