Catrin Davies

Mwanahamisi Singano

Senior Global Policy Lead of the Women's Environment & Development Organization

i don't believe

you want so badly to be pure again,

you call yourself a lamb, a doll, an innocent little thing

but the color pink doesn't wash away sin

and shiny rosaries don't make you

any less scared of god

Ms. Verene Shepherd, Vice-Chairperson, Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination

Ms. Whitney Mélinard, President, Kopounoule Inc

Scrough

v. intr.

to mindlessly perform a tedious task that nobody will ever notice, required by a bureaucracy that nobody fully owns, in pursuit of outcomes that nobody really wants.

Mauerbauertraurigkeit

n.

the inexplicable urge to push people away, even close friends whose company you generally enjoy—like a poker player who keeps folding a promising hand in order to avoid the pain of losing, or tamp down the urge to go all-in.

Nullness

n.

a state of instinctive restlessness that arises when your society makes too many choices on your behalf—foreclosing all risks, codifying all moral dilemmas, deciding in advance whether you’ll succeed or fail—as if your conscience had been outsourced to an external provider, so it’s no longer necessary to have one on site.

Endzoned

n.

the hollow feeling of having gotten exactly what you thought you wanted, only to learn that it didn’t make you happy.

Anthrodynia

n.

a state of exhaustion with how cruel people can be, freely undercutting each other in ways that seem petty and gratuitous—which can sometimes trigger a countervailing sense of gratitude for things that are kind, sincere, forgiving, or unabashedly joyful.