I think that if we can't go back, then we should try even harder to go forward. And I do want to go forward, to a place where loving someone because they have a gentle smile and a friendly hello is as easy as it once was.

Each time I think there is no place lower to go, I find that there is at least one place that will mess you up worse than you were.

We all know we should eat right and we should exercise, but reading is treated as if it's this wonderful adjunct.

I would enjoy having dinner with the poet/playwright Derek Walcott.

I want young people to be hesitant to glorify war and to demand of their leaders justification for the sacrifices they ask of our citizens.

America believes what's good for us is good for the world. It's very difficult to understand that that's not necessarily true.

As a kid I didn't see black cowboys on the screen. What that said to me was that there were things I couldn't do or be because of my color. What we see others like us do gives us permission to expand our own horizons.