Growing up at my grandmother's table, she always had rice. She might do something as exotic as potatoes or spaghetti, but there was still always rice, just in case you needed a little rice fix.

Laugh and dare to try to love somebody, starting with yourself. You must love yourself first, of course, and you must protect yourself so that nobody overrides you, overrules you, or steps on you. Just say, 'Just a minute. I'm worth everything, dear.'

My life has been long, and believing that life loves the liver of it, I have dared to try many things, sometimes trembling, but daring still.

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

I like to go back and read poems that I wrote fifty years ago, twenty years ago, and sometimes they surprise me - I didn't know I knew that then. Or maybe I didn't know it then, and I know more now.

The trouble for the thief is not how to steal the chief’s bugle, but where to blow it.

People don't always remember what you say or even what you do, but they always remember how you make them feel.