by Lola Riley
I woke at 10 and fell late outside a library in Amsterdam where
colleagues and I read archives of lesbians from the 70s who bit the world to change
before their teeth were cut. I
traced doodles and spoke loosely of bodies. We grabbed
coffee and croissants and touched one another’s shoulders and sat in
silence for a while. I kissed them goodbye and
finished papers from a brown table with wine. I walked into town
and called my mother and promised I ate. A barmaid told me she wished she had my eyes then held my hand
because I was alone. I took a bottle to the cinema and watched
a film about a chimpanzee who killed the family that adopted him and wondered why
it’s easy to make Evil anthropomorphic when the worst pain comes from people
you know and people you don’t. Like Nanjing or that Friday
I didn’t go to school. I enjoyed it because I was drunk and I like cheap scares and I hate myself and
I am scared I am always going to feel sick. I stood on the side of the street until a tall lady with no hair
helped me put the chain back on my bike and told me everything is going to be ok.
I threw up in my toilet and lit a candle by my bedside
and drew lines of the women who came before me and vowed
I too will not forgive and forget like a dog
Lola Riley is currently pursuing her master’s at Utrecht University, where her research explores gender politics and women’s agency in the Global South. Her work looks at literature and cultural narratives as tools of survival and transformation, examining how storytelling confronts power across complex geopolitical landscapes. In her creative writing, she tackles those same heavy fault lines, examining how history, political conflict, and structural violence leave their marks on love, grief, and intimate human connection.
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