I speak to the broken halves of all our selves and tell them to embrace, loving the worst in us equally with the best.

(I)f we are going to be kind, let it be out of simple generosity, not because we fear guilt or retribution.

The writers who have the deepest influence on one are those one reads in ones more impressionable, early life, and often it is the more youthful works of those writers that leave the deepest imprint.

When all else fails, philosophize.

We must cultivate, all of us, a certain ignorance, a certain blindness, or society will not be tolerable.

I know somewhat too much; and from this knowledge, once one has been infected, there seems to be no recovering.

All creatures come into the world bringing with them the memory of justice.

But he cannot see a connection between the end of yearning and the end of poetry. Is that what growing up amounts to: growing out of yearning, of passion, of all intensities of the soul?

I don't think we are ready to die, any of us, not without being escorted.

A book should be an axe to chop open the frozen sea inside us.

Become major, Paul. Live like a hero. That's what the classics teach us. Be a main character. Otherwise what is life for?

Not to alarm you or anything, but I think you just made a deal with a Mexican gang." I've read Simone Elkeles books. I know how this whole garage as a front thing works.

The heart will break, but broken live on.

We need to stop fighting Christian against Christian. I have no time for anything but trying to love other people. That is a full-time job.

The financial crisis we are facing today arises from the fact that there is almost no more social, cultural, natural, and spiritual capital left to convert into money.

Should check the Internet and make sure everything on there is correct.

if you don't have peace, it isn't because someone took it from you; you gave it away. You cannot always control what happens to you, but you can control what happens in you.

Genius cannot escape the taint of its time more than a child the influence of its begetting.

Nothing's as easy as it is on a sitcom. Issues that we take care of in 20 minutes on the show can stretch out over years in real families.

I was very fortunate to be able to represent an icon to many African Americans.