I am not wrong: Wrong is not my name

If we lived in a democratic state our language would have to hurtle, fly, curse, and sing, in all the common American names, all the undeniable and representative and participating voices of everybody here.

I am a stranger, learning to love the strangers around me

Self-determination has to mean that the leader is your individual gut, and heart, and mind or we're talking about power, again, and its rather well-known impurities. Who is really going to care whether you live or die and who is going to know the most intimate motivation for your laughter and your tears is the only person to be trusted to speak for you and to decide what you will or will not do.

That a little child will lead us back to the child we will always be, vulnerable and wanting and hurting for love and for beauty.

If we even tolerate any oppression of gay and lesbian Americans, if we join those who would intrude upon the choices of our hearts, then who among us shall be free?

I care because I want you to care about me. I care because I have become aware of my absolute dependency upon you, whoever you are, for the outcome of my social, my democratic experience.