The forest is the first cathedral. I felt that from the time I was a child. I credit my mother with that. I used to think it came from her Native-American side. Whichever it was, she instinctively connected with nature, and taught me that. Church just could not hold my spirit.

no person is your friend (or kin) who demands your silence, or denies your right to grow and be perceived as fully blossomed as you were intended. Or who belittles in any fashion the gifts you labor so to bring into the world.

It's better to have your blackness taken away than to stand and lie about who you actually are.

As you know from school, it's when you have not prepared for the test that you have the fear of failing. And if you have prepared, even if you fail, you've done your best.

I love the natural world - it comes from my culture, which grew out of a people enslaved.

allowing freedom to others brings freedom to ourselves.

But it ain't easy, trying to do without God even if you know he ain't there, trying to do without him is a strain