I always work with text orally in the writing process, saying passages aloud to measure flow.

I couldn't write about love without writing about hate - specifically, how the experience of hatred embeds itself in the body and prevents love from entering or leaving.

I have been and continue to be committed to art as a tool to ignite, comfort, and discomfort.

Now is not the time for Canadians to be sanctimonious. It is time for us to be prudent and active.

Children's books have great potential to reveal new possibilities to readers, because the intended audience is at an age of genuine learning.

In poetry, I didn't have to provide resolution. I could ask hard questions without feeling responsible for the answers.

As a person of color, I know race can't be stripped from admiration or preference.

I have dedicated a significant portion of my time and artistry to making art that addresses various forms of oppression, including white supremacy, misogyny, and biphobia.

I do use art as a site of protest, particularly in relation to dominant narratives.

I feel like I have had to catch up to the art I've made, and learn from the protagonists I have written, especially in relation to gender.

It's exciting to consider how art, in its ability to reveal, can be ahead of the artist.

We co-create our reality with others in unseen ways.

The purpose of a writer is to keep civilization from destroying itself.

When the sky is fully covered by the birds, you will feel the winds of pure freedom beneath this sky!

To believe in the possibilities of self is to unleash the power of the spirit quieted by doubt ~

To be a leader you have to jump into the ocean of uncertainty and lead the followers toward the known or unknown destination.

Success in warfare is gained by carefully accommodating ourselves to the enemy's purpose.

One is always enthralled, I think, when a young writer you're just beginning to read and comprehend dies.

Was it worth it? Feeling better for a minute or two, knowing that the cold would still be out there waiting?

Anybody that's old and closed-minded does not like Rick James... They don't like the fact that I'm free and I'm wide open.

The laws of morals and the laws of music are the same