I'm just this Dominican kid from New Jersey.

Migration gives a blank cheque to put anything you don't feel like addressing in the memory hold. No neighbours can go against the monster narrative of your family.

I don't think you can be from the Caribbean and not know a certain amount about the apocalypse.

The whole culture is telling you to hurry, while the art tells you to take your time. Always listen to the art.

Sometimes you just have to try, even if you know it won’t work.

She's applying her lipstick; I've always believed that the universe invented the color red solely for Latinas.

If you want to make a human being into a monster, deny them, at the cultural level any reflection of themselves

We get these lives for free. I didn't do anything to get this life, and no matter what the hardships are, it is free and, in a way, it's an extraordinary bargain.

Colleagues are a wonderful thing - but mentors, that's where the real work gets done.

I think the average guy thinks they're pro-woman, just because they think they're a nice guy and someone has told them that they're awesome. But the truth is far from it.

[Donald] Trump is taking America's dirty laundry to the center stage. Everything he does, the rest of the country already does really well: victimize immigrants, poor people, women.

Black and white is refuge of colors from their own nullity.

A book with the genuine power to stir and comfort its readers.

You will not find it in the words of poets or the longing eyes of sailors. If you want to know of love, look to a trouper's hands as he makes his music. A trouper knows.

All our ancient history, as one of our wits remarked, is no more than accepted fiction.

With a public library card in your hand, you have access to the Internet and a world of opportunities.

A secret society within a secret society.

You must continue to gain expertise, but avoid thinking like an expert.

There is no one else who can ever fill your role in the same way, so it's a good idea to perform it as well as possible.

Western interests: imperialism, colonialism, exploitation, racism, and other negative -isms.

Over this odd world, this half the world that's dark now, I have to hunt a thing that lives on tears.