We do the best we can with what we know, and when we know better, we do better.

There were people who went to sleep last night, poor and rich and white and black, but they will never wake again. And those dead folks would give anything at all for just five minutes of this weather or ten minutes of plowing. So you watch yourself about complaining. What you're supposed to do when you don't like a thing is change it. If you can't change it, change the way you think about it.

I respect myself and insist upon it from everybody. And because I do it, I then respect everybody, too.

Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with deeper meaning.

You may shoot me with your words, you may cut me with your eyes, you may kill me with your hatefulness, but still, like air, I'll rise!

Let choice whisper in your ear and love murmur in your heart. Be ready. Here comes life.

I have respect for the past, but I'm a person of the moment.