her stomach QUOTES

1 " Your daughter is ugly.
She knows loss intimately,
carries whole cities in her belly.

As a child, relatives wouldn’t hold her.
She was splintered wood and sea water.
They said she reminded them of the war.

On her fifteenth birthday you taught her
how to tie her hair like rope
and smoke it over burning frankincense.

You made her gargle rosewater
and while she coughed, said
macaanto girls like you shouldn’t smell
of lonely or empty.

You are her mother.
Why did you not warn her,
hold her like a rotting boat
and tell her that men will not love her
if she is covered in continents,
if her teeth are small colonies,
if her stomach is an island
if her thighs are borders?

What man wants to lay down
and watch the world burn
in his bedroom?

Your daughter’s face is a small riot,
her hands are a civil war,
a refugee camp behind each ear,
a body littered with ugly things

but God,
doesn’t she wear
the world well. "

― Warsan Shire

2 " In the pit of her stomach she realized that everything she raged against on Saturday night-- the restrictions, rules, and guidelines-- was born of an ancient fervor. Every rule ever established, from the beginning of time, invited mutiny. "

― Robin Jones Gunn , Peculiar Treasures (Katie Weldon, #1)

3 " He turned then and those blue eyes met hers from across the sea of people. Her stomach bottomed out. Damn it. She couldn't be attracted to the arrogant ass.
Somehow repeating herself wasn't helping. "

― Billi Jean , Midnight Star (Sisters of the Moon, #1)

4 " Emma dropped the paper. Her first impression was of a weak feeling in her stomach and in her knees; then of blind guilt, of unreality, of coldness, of fear; then she wished that it were already the next day. Immediately afterwards she realized that that wish was futile because the death of her father was the only thing that had happened in the world, and it would go on happening endlessly. "

― Jorge Luis Borges , The Aleph and Other Stories

5 " You are her mother.
Why did you not warn her,
hold her like a rotting boat
and tell her that men will not love her
if she is covered in continents,
if her teeth are small colonies,
if her stomach is an island
if her thighs are borders?

What man wants to lie down
and watch the world burn
in his bedroom?

Your daughter ’s face is a small riot,
her hands are a civil war,
a refugee camp behind each ear,
a body littered with ugly things.

But God,
doesn’t she wear
the world well? "

― Warsan Shire , Teaching My Mother How to Give Birth

6 " She'd had sex with a demon. Tayla swallowed bile and tried to keep her stomach from heaving. She needed to shower. And douche. "

― Larissa Ione , Pleasure Unbound (Demonica, #1)

7 " Bella. " Nathan Malone is dead." He caught her shoulders, shook her." No!" she screamed back. And she couldn't hit him. She wanted to, and she couldn't." look at me," he yelled. " Look at me, Bella. What happened killed the man you loved. All that is left is this. The man you see now.The name name I carry now. Anything else is no possible." " No!" She pulled away from him, stumbled to her feet, and shook with the rage pounding through her. " The name may be dead, but you are not dead. " You weren't just a SEAL," she cried. " You weren't just a friend, or a son, or a grandson, or a brother. You weren't just a warrior." She clenched her fists, pressed to her stomach as the agony swell up through every cell of her body. " You are my husband. My lover.It doesn't matter if your name is Nathan, Noah, or hey fucking you, you are my my lover. My soul. My heart. "

8 " I have read so many books. And yet, like most Autodidacts, I am never quite sure of what I have gained from them. There are days when I feel I have been able to grasp all there is to know in one single gaze, as if invisible branches suddenly spring out of no where, weaving together all the disparate strands of my reading. And then suddenly the meaning escapes, the essence evaporates and no matter how often I reread the same lines they seem to flee ever further with each subsequent reading and I see myself as some mad old fool who thinks her stomach is full because she's been reading the menu. "

― Muriel Barbery , The Elegance of the Hedgehog

9 " Annabelle, what happened to you?” Lillian asked the next morning. “You look dreadful. Why aren’t you wearing your riding habit? I thought you were going to try out the jumping course this morning. And why did you disappear
so suddenly last night? It’s not like you to simply vanish without saying—”

“I didn’t have a choice in the matter,” Annabelle said testily, folding her fingers around the delicate bowl of a porcelain teacup. Looking pale and exhausted, her blue eyes ringed with dark shadows, she swallowed a mouthful of heavily sweetened tea before continuing. “It was that blasted perfume of yours—as soon as he caught one whiff of it, he went berserk.”

Shocked, Lillian tried to take in the information, her stomach plummeting. “It… it had an effect on Westcliff, then?” she managed to ask.

“Good Lord, not Lord Westcliff.” Annabelle rubbed her weary eyes. “He couldn’t have cared less what I smelled like. It was my husband who went completely mad. After he caught the scent of that stuff, he dragged me up to our room and…well, suffice it to say, Mr. Hunt kept me awake all night. All night ,” she repeated in sullen emphasis, and drank deeply of the tea.

“Doing what?” Daisy asked blankly.

Lillian, who was feeling a rush of relief that Lord Westcliff had not been attracted to Annabelle while she
was wearing the perfume, gave her younger sister a derisive glance. “What do you think they were doing? Playing a few hands of Find-the-Lady? "

― Lisa Kleypas , It Happened One Autumn (Wallflowers, #2)

10 " Hey!” The male voice sliced through the noise. Terri ignored him, determined to get back to the bar for her next order. A harsh hand gripped her arm, jerking her back into a firm chest. “I asked your name.” Hot breath reeking of stale beer permeated her sinuses, making her stomach turn, as the tenor of his voice burrowed into her ear.
Fear gripped her. Memories of the way Randy would grab her, and where it always ended, slammed into her, making her head spin. Shaking it off, Terri narrowed her eyes and whirled around, jabbing a red lacquered nail into his powder blue polo. “Back off,” she warned, snatching her arm back.
He advanced on her, his large frame towering over her. “Just wanna know your name, sweetheart,” he said with a sleazy smile. “No need to get testy.”
“You haven’t seen me testy.”
As she turned her back on him and continued on her way, he called out to her.
“Yet.”

Terri--from Spring Cleaning--Coming Summer 2012 "

― Brandi Salazar , Spring Cleaning

11 " There was something about the music on that tape. It felt different. Like, it set her lungs and her stomach on edge. There was something exciting about it, and something nervous. It made Eleanor feel like everything, like the world, wasn't what she'd thought it was. And that was a good thing. That was the greatest thing. "

― Rainbow Rowell , Eleanor & Park

12 " By the time they were pulling into the parking lot of the A&P, the mood was fading, the moment gone. Amy could feel it go. Perhaps it was nothing more than the two doughnuts expanding in her stomach full of milk, but Amy felt a heaviness begin, a familiar turning of some inward tide. As they drove over the bridge the sun seemed to move from a cheerful daytime yellow to an early-evening gold; painful how the gold light hit the riverbanks, rich and sorrowful, drawing from Amy some longing, a craving for joy. "

― Elizabeth Strout , Amy and Isabelle

13 " He slid a hand over her stomach and down to her mound. He cupped it possessively and was pleased when she sucked in a breath at her unmistakable wetness." This is mine too." She swallowed hard again but didn't respond. More importantly, she didn't argue.But it wasn't enough. " Say it." He needed to hear the words. Needed to know she wanted him as much as he wanted her.She held his gaze, stared back at him in the mirror, her eyes dilated with arousal. " I'm yours. "

14 " When their chatter died to a contented lull, a small red squirrel ventured out of the oak grove and turned to the side, watching them with one bright black eye." An intruder," Annabelle observed, with a delicate yawn.Evie rolled to her stomach and tossed a bread crust in the squirrel's direction. He froze and stared at the tantalizing offering, but was too timid to advance. Evie tilted her head, her hair glittering in the sun as if it had been overlaid with a net of rubies. " Poor little thing," she said softly, casting another crust at the timid squirrel. This one landed a few inches closer, and his tail twitched eagerly. " Be brave," Evie coaxed. " Go on and take it." Smiling tolerantly, she tossed another crust, which landed a scant few inches from him. " Oh, Mr. Squirrel," Evie reproved. " You're a dreadful coward. Can't you see that no one's going to harm you?" In a sudden burst of initiative, the squirrel seized the tidbit and scampered off with his tail quivering. Looking up with a triumphant smile, Evie saw the other wallflowers staring at her in drop-jawed silence. " Wh-what is it?" she asked, puzzled.Annabelle was the first to speak. " Just now, when you were talking to that squirrel, you didn't stammer." " Oh." Suddenly abashed, Evie lowered her gaze and grimaced. " I never stammer when I'm talking to children or animals. I don't know why. "

15 " Close your eyes, Maxon." What?" " Close your eyes.Somewhere in this palace, there is a woman who will be your wife. This girl? imagine that she depends on you. She needs you to cherish her and make her feel like the Selection didn't even happen. Like if you were dropped in your own out in the middle of the country to wander around door to door, she's still the one you would have found. She was always the one you would have picked. She needs you to provide for her and protect her. And if it came to a point where there was absolutely nothing to eat, and you couldn't even fall asleep at night because the sound of her stomach growling kept you awake—" " Stop it!" " Sorry." " Is that really what it's like? Out there... does that happen? Are people hungry like that a lot?" " Maxon, I..." " Tell me the truth." " Yes. That happens. I know of families where people give up their share for their children or siblings. I know of a boy who was whipped in the town square for stealing food. Sometimes you do crazy things when you are desperate." " A boy? How old?" " Nine." " Have you ever been like that? Starving?...How bad?" " Maxon, it will only upset you more." " Probably, but I'm only starting to realize how much I don't know about my own country. Please." " We've been pretty bad. Most time if it gets to where we have to choose, we keep the food and lose electricity. The worst was when it happened near Christmas one year. May didn't understand why we couldn't exchange gifts. As a general rule, there are never any leftovers at my house. Someone always wants more. I know the checks we've gotten over the last few weeks have really helped, and my family is really smart about money. I'm sure they have already tucked it away so it will stretch out for a long time. You've done so much for us, Maxon." " Good God. When you said that you were only here for the food, you weren't kidding, were you?" " Really, Maxon, we've been doing pretty well lately. I—" " I'll see you at dinner. "

16 " She and Kennedy both dove for the power connector; Kennedy reached it first and yanked out the connection as Alex landed on her stomach beside it.

The air settled down until the fine hairs on her arm no longer stood on end. Alex dropped her forehead to the platform and started laughing. “Just like university, isn’t it?”

“Almost—nothing’s actually blown up yet. "

― G.S. Jennsen , Rubicon (Aurora Resonant #2; Amaranthe #8)

17 " One of the most elusive things about the white shark is their, uh..." His eyes moved to hers and he held them there." Their what?" she asked when he didn't finish, a bit rapt by his expression.He kept his eyes locked on her. " Their mating." " Mating," she repeated, feeling a flutter in her stomach at the way he was looking at her...then suddenly not looking at her." We don't know if individual animals spawn in a certain spot every time --- kind of like a human might go to a particular pub if she wants some action. Juan an example, mind you?She folded her arm, feeling her cheeks heat up. " Pub Uh-huh." Jeff leaned against the railing, his expression looking smug at her embarrassment. " For all we know, sharks are just, ya know, doing it everywhere." " Like the Kardasians?" ...." But who know. Maybe, if we play just the right mood music, you and I will get lucky, Sharona Blaire." Was he talking about shark reproduction... or human?And... was he flirting? Earlier, he'd gone cold and hostile when she'd tried to apologize. The man was a ball of contradiction. A very sexy, very nice-smelling contradiction." Well." She swallowed, staring in his eyes. " I'm all for getting lucky. "

18 " She maneuvered onto the board, getting into position on her stomach just like he'd taught, and tried not to freak out. She never should have watched Shark Week last year. "

― Robin Bielman , Keeping Mr. Right Now (Kisses in the Sand, #1)

19 " One more salt to try," Kellan said, reaching into the box. He brought a jar of black, flaky crystals up to the light. " Black diamond finishing salt. Extremely rare and too bold for those with meek palates. But, for a true connoisseur, the flavor is incomparable." He lowered her head and torso to the ground and pushed her sweater up to expose her stomach and ribs. " I want to sample it on your skin. "

20 " In the pause that followed, Shane understood why people said their hearts broke. She always thought it was a weak metaphor of strong emotion. She could feel each bit of shrapnel from her heart stab at her stomach and lungs. Her knees gave out beneath her as she heard the voice tell her what she already knew in her fragments of cardiac tissue. "

― Thomm Quackenbush , We Shadows (Night's Dream, #1)

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