The forties and fifties were years of high poet-incense; the language-flowers were thickly sweet. Those flowers whined and begged white folks to pick them, to find them lovable. Then the '60s: Independent fire!

There are no magics or elves / Or timely godmothers to guide us. We are lost, must / Wizard a track through our own screaming weed.

I am an ordinary human being who is impelled to write poetry. ... I still do feel that a poet has a duty to words, and that words can do wonderful things, and it's too bad to just let them lie there without doing anything with and for them.

We are each other's magnitude and bond.

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

I don't like the idea of the black race being diluted out of existence. I like the idea of all of us being here.

It is brave to be involved