Mama learned to laugh with them, before they could laugh at her, and to do it so well no one could be sure what she really thought or felt.

That was what gospel was meant to do - make you hate and love yourself at the same time, make you ashamed and glorified.

I need you to do more than survive. As writers, as revolutionaries, tell the truth, your truth in your own way.

The horror of class stratification, racism, and prejudice is that some people begin to believe that the security of their families and communities depends on the oppression of others, that for some to have good lives there must be others whose lives are truncated and brutal.

Don't go taking that gospel stuff seriously. It's nice to clean you out now and then, but it ain't for real. It's like bad whiskey. Run through you fast and leave you with pain.

And of course these days I feel like there is a nation of us - displaced southerners and children of the working class. We listen to Steve Earle, Mary J. Blige, and k.d. lang. We devour paperback novels and tell evil mean stories, value stubbornness above patience and a sense of humor more than a college education. We claim our heritage with a full appreciation of how often it has been disdained. And let me promise you, you do not want to make us angry.

People don't do right because of the fear of God or love of him. You do right because the world doesn't make sense if you don't.