I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.

Every woman I have ever loved has left her print upon me, where I loved some invaluable piece of myself apart from me-so different that I had to stretch and grow in order to recognize her. And in that growing, we came to separation, that place where work begins.

Every woman I have ever known has made a lasting impression on my soul.

Whenever a conscious Black woman raises her voice on issues central to her existence, somebody is going to call her strident, because they don't want to hear about it, nor us. I refuse to be silenced and I refuse to be trivialized, even if I do not say what I have to say perfectly.

Attend me, hold me in your muscular flowering arms, protect me from throwing any part of myself away.

In our work and in our living, we must recognize that difference is a reason for celebration and growth, rather than a reason for destruction.

Every Black woman in America lives her life somewhere along a wide curve of ancient and unexpressed angers.