Anything I have ever learned of any consequence, I have learned from Black people. I have never been bored by any Black person, ever.

I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer - its dust and lowering skies.

If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.

The function of freedom is to free someone else.

Don’t beg anybody for anything, especially love.

There is no such thing as race. None. There is just a human race - scientifically, anthropologically. Racism is a construct, a social construct... it has a social function, racism.

There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.

If there's a book you really want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.

In times of dread, artists must never choose to remain silent.

All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was.

Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence; does more than represent the limits of knowledge; it limits knowledge.

Leaders succeed or fail depending on whether or not they clarify role expectations and keep their promises.

You can’t improve what you won’t face and own.

The most delightful surprise in life is to suddenly recognize your own worth.

She filed those moments away like precious documents, wore them smooth with memory, collected them like bits of prayers.

You build on cost and you borrow on value.

Let deeds match words.

My policy is I am always more than happy to say, "I'm sorry if I hurt your feelings." What I am not willing to do is take back what I said. Unless I am wrong.

Doesn't reincarnation strike you as just another form of procrastination?

Take Wrigley's Chewing Gum. I don't think the Internet is going to change how people chew gum.