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.

Life for my child is simple, and is good.

Don't let anyone call you a minority if you're black or Hispanic or belong to some other ethnic group. You're not less than anybody else.

I felt that I had to write. Even if I had never been published, I knew that I would go on writing, enjoying it and experiencing the challenge.

Already I am no longer looked at with lechery or love.

She was afraid to suggest to him that to most people, nothing "happens." That most people merely live from day to day until they die. That, after he had been dead a year, doubtless fewer than five people would think of him oftener than once a year. That there might even come a year when no one on earth would think of him at all.

What shall I give my children? who are poor, / Who are adjudged the leastwise of the land...