The joy of poetry is that it will wait for you. Novels don't wait for you. Characters change. But poetry will wait. I think it's the greatest art.

Zora Neale Hurston said fear is the greatest emotion and I said, 'No my dear sister.' Fear will make us move to save our own skins. Love also makes us save ourselves, but it will make us move to save others as well.

The most fundamental truth to be told in any art form, as far as Blacks are concerned, is that America is killing us.

So much of growing up is an unbearable waiting. A constant longing for another time. Another season.

... in order to be a true revolutionary, you must understand love. Love, sacrifice, and death.

All poets, all writers are political. They either maintain the status quo, or they say, 'Something's wrong, let's change it for the better.'

Poetry is subconscious conversation, it is as much the work of those who understand it and those who make it.