For within livin structures defined by profit, by linear power, by institutional dehumanization, our feelings were not meant to survive. Kept around as unavoidable adjuncts or pleasant pastimes, our feelings were expected to kneel to thought as women were expected to kneel to men. But women have survived. As poets.

What I most regretted were my silences. Of what had I ever been afraid?

I am not just a lesbian. I am not just a poet. I am not just a mother. Honor the complexity of your vision and yourselves.

I learned so much from listening to people. And all I knew was, the only thing I had was honesty and openness.

pornography is a direct denial of the power of the erotic, for it represents the suppression of true feeling. Pornography emphasizes sensation without feeling.

Those of us who stand outside the circle of this society's definition of acceptable women; those of us who have been forged in the crucibles of difference - those of us who are poor, who are lesbians, who are black, who are older - know that survival is not an academic skill...For the master's tools will not dismantle the master's house. They will never allow us to bring about genuine change.

Our feelings are our most genuine paths to knowledge.