If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive.

For women, the need and desire to nurture each other is not pathological but redemptive, and it is within that knowledge that our real power is rediscovered. It is this real connection, which is so feared by a patriarchal world.

Revolution is not a one time event.

Raising Black children — female and male — in the mouth of a racist, sexist, suicidal dragon is perilous and chancy. If they cannot love and resist at the same time, they will probably not survive. And in order to survive they must let go. This is what mothers teach — love, survival — that is, self-definition and letting go.

Next time, ask: What's the worst that will happen? Then push yourself a little further than you dare.

Because the machine will try to grind you into dust anyway, whether or not we speak.

When we define ourselves, when I define myself, the place in which I am like you and the place in which I am not like you, I'm not excluding you from the joining - I'm broadening the joining.