Don't tell me what they did to you as though you had no choice. Tell me, isn't that your picture? Isn't that your voice.

In any marginalized community, whether people identify themselves or not affects us all.

I always wanted to be commander-in-chief of my one-woman army, But I can envision the mediocrity of my finest hour.

Music has as many roles as people make it. I traveled to Burma once years ago to witness the people's struggle for democracy, meet some people and learn some stuff. And I had this incredible experience over and over again in the Burmese jungle or refugee camps or health clinics with very oppressed, very devastated people. I show up, and I'm white and I'm American and I'm privileged and I have an experience that these people can't fathom and vice versa. There was this huge chasm when I met people for all good reasons.

Feel free to listen, feel free to stare.

I did a lot of work with myself over the course of being pregnant and the first few months of being pregnant. It's nice, the pace of being pregnant; it gives you a long time to not just germinate a baby but germinate the mother that you're gonna be.

First decide what you got to do, then go out and do it. All we can do is to see each other through it.