Age is nothing; waking up is everything.

Eating is so intimate. It's very sensual. When you invite someone to sit at your table and you want to cook for them, you're inviting a person into your life.

Shakespeare must be a black girl.

If a human being dreams a great dream, dares to love somebody; if a human being dares to be Martin King, or Mahatma Gandhi, or Mother Theresa, or Malcolm X; if a human being dares to be bigger than the condition into which she or he was born-it means so can you. And so you can try to stretch, stretch, stretch yourself so you can internalize, 'Homo sum, humani nil a me alienum puto. I am a human being, nothing human can be alien to me.' That's one thing I'm learning.

If I'm here, I'll be trying to be a better human being, a better writer, a better friend and a better beloved.

Take a day to heal from the lies you've told yourself and the ones that have been told to you.

If I'm the people's poet, then I ought to be in people's hands - and, I hope, in their heart.