At the very beginning when I begin writing a poem I try not to think of the audience or anyone at all except for trying to get at the very center of what is driving that poem. In a way it's like analyzing myself.

We should always do something that makes us feel like a child again. Keep learning, no matter what it is.

I loved to read, but I always thought that the dream was too far away. The person who had written the book was a god, it wasn't a person.

I wish someone had told me that my stories are really mine to tell. In other words, anything that I think is important or that has moved me has the ability to move somebody else.

I was apprehensive. I feared every time I talked about poetry, it would be filtered through the lens of race, sex, and age.

Instead of trying to come up and pontificate on what literature is, you need to talk with children, to teachers, and make sure they get poetry in the curriculum early.

My childhood library was small enough not to be intimidating. And yet I felt the whole world was contained in those two rooms. I could walk any aisle and smell wisdom.