It frightens me to realize that, if I had died before the age of fifty, I would have died a 'Negro' fraction.

I am interested in telling my particular truth as I have seen it.

beware the easy griefs / that fool and fuel nothing.

I don't want people running around saying Gwen Brooks's work is intellectual. That makes people think instantly about obscurity. It shouldn't have to mean that, but it often seems to.

I tell poets that when a line just floats into your head, don't pay attention 'cause it probably has floated into somebody else's head.

We are each other's harvest; we are each other's business; we are each other's magnitude and bond.

First fight. Then fiddle.