We need to remember to teach our children that solitude can be a much-to-be-desired condition. Not only is it acceptable to be alone; at times it is positively to be wished for.....In the silence we listen to ourselves. Then we ask questions of ourselves. We describe ourselves to ourselves, and in the quietude we may even hear the voice of God.

Blacks concede that hurrawing, jibing, jiving, signifying, disrespecting, cursing, even outright insults might be acceptable under particular conditions, but aspersions cast against one's family call for immediate attack.

You dwell in whitened castles with deep and poisoned moats and cannot hear the curses which fill your children's throats.

Being free is being able to accept people for what they are, and not try to understand all they are or be what they are.

If I have a monument in this world, it is my son.

We need language to tell us who we are, how we feel, what we're capable of- to explain the pains and glory of our existence.

Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.