I tend to integrate poet and scholar is by ironizing the scholarship. My hope is to disturb that space between the two so they can coexist in a kind of mutual uncertainty.

Both the poet and scholar are trying to learn something. The poem for me is a pursuit. Some of the answers are within. Some of the answers are without.

I admit I keep a clichéd ironic distance with many things in the world, but Brooklyn is not one of them.

Before you sleep, read something that is exquisite, and worth remembering.

That a man can take pleasure in marching in formation to the strains of a band is enough to make me despise him. He has only been given his big brain by mistake; a backbone was all he needed.

One has very little influence upon one's children. Their characters are what they are and one can do nothing to change them.

Improvisation, for me, is when the cameras start rolling, we don't know where we're going and let's just waste people's time and money.

To me our music is like Jamaican stuff - if they can't hear it, they're not supposed to hear it. It's not for them if they can't understand it.

There's no cap on success. The jury stays out till you take your last breath.

Proverbial wisdom counsels against risk and change. But sitting ducks fare worst of all.

It is time for the next generations to continue our struggle against social injustice and for the rights of humanity. It is in your hands.

So long as there is one [person] who seeks employment and cannot find it, the hours of work are too long.

To each person, their own way of death - with dignity.