I think we need leadership that helps us remember that part of what we are about is caring about more than the person right next to us, but the folks across the way.

Each person has a literature inside them.

People who are sick, or who have been sick, or have come close to death have a lot to say - and they want you to hear it.

Confidence is the mark of a hopeful disposition.

Some people study a text very deeply. The people are my text. I study their words and what their words sound like, over and over again.

Somehow we can't live outside the politics of race. There's something very deep in all of us, that is taught to us when we are very, very little. Which is the disrespect and fear of the other.

I think we can learn a lot about a person in the very moment that language fails them. In the very moment they they have to be more creative than they would have imagined in order to communicate. It's the very moment that they have to dig deeper than the surface to find words, and at the same time, it's a moment when they want to communicate very badly. They're digging deep and projecting out at the same time.