I've been reading poetry publicly for 20 years, and this is what you do - you express, you sometimes dig a bit to get a conversation started. That's the point of poetry. You're supposed to go, 'Hmmmm,' and 'Woooh!'

In order to grow emotionally and mentally, sometimes you have to grow physically as well. I'm just trying to grow, man, and always I just want to be the best and most confident me I can be.

Beauty is an understanding of what you have, and it's forgiving yourself of what you don't have, and appreciating all of it.

All I have to do is be me on stage. But acting, I have to be someone else, and walk how they would walk and blink how they would blink. I used to talk about it bad like, 'Aw man, that person made $10 million a movie?' But now I understand why they do. I get it now.

I have been training since 8th grade, but it has to do with listening, more than practice.

I like to read Octavia E. Butler's 'Wild Seed' over and over again. And J. California Cooper's 'The Wake of the Wind.' That one makes me cry from joy. I'll mourn - I'll actually mourn - and then I'll cry from joy. She's wonderful.

I don't necessarily think of myself as a feminist, but I'm a whole person.