I knew Stokely [Carmichael] and them, but when you got to that, you saw that Nina Simone started to take up their burden. She started to preach for them. She was taking on the burden of "I want to tell the people."

I try to impress upon my students the importance of looking, listening... paying attention, in other words. You must pay attention.

Poems don't have to rhyme... Poems are about beauty and emotion; in other words poems are about feelings.

Style has a profound meaning to Black Americans. If we can’t drive, we will invent walks and the world will envy the dexterity of our feet. If we can’t have ham, we will boil chitterlings; if we are given rotten peaches, we will make cobblers; if given scraps, we will make quilts; take away our drums, and we will clap our hands. We prove the human spirit will prevail. We will take what we have to make what we need. We need confidence in our knowledge of who we are.

I prefer her [Nina Simone's] jazz period much more so than her folk period.

We write because we believe the human spirit cannot be tamed and should not be trained.

Mistakes are a fact of life. If you are willing to be wrong then you have earned the right to be right.