I would run into the corner store, the bodega, and just grab a paper bag or buy juice - anything just to get a paper bag. And I'd write the words on the paper bag and stuff these ideas in my pocket until I got back. Then I would transfer them into the notebook.

Treat my first like my last and the last like my first and my thirst is the same as- when I came.

People who don't know you, you don't know their motives. They smile at you all day, "Oh, that's great. You've done it again! You're the greatest!" And that's not good for an artist.

A poet's mission is to make words do more work than they normally do, to make them work on more than one level.

Rap has been a path between cultures in the best tradition of popular music.

Is to have had and lost/Better than not having at all?

I get my by any means on, whenever there's a drought get your umbrellas out because that's when I brainstorm.