In fact, in lyric poetry, truthfulness becomes recognizable as a ring of truth within the medium itself.

Hope is not optimism, which expects things to turn out well, but something rooted in the conviction that there is good worth working for.

Believe that a further shore is reachable from here.

Even if the hopes you started out with are dashed, hope has to be maintained.

Anyone with gumption and a sharp mind will take the measure of two things: what's said and what's done.

I can't think of a case where poems changed the world, but what they do is they change people's understanding of what's going on in the world.

If you have the words, there's always a chance that you'll find the way.

History says, Don’t hope On this side of the grave, But then, once in a lifetime The longed-for tidal wave Of justice can rise up, And hope and history rhyme

Poetry is always slightly mysterious, and you wonder what is your relationship to it.

All I know is a door into the dark

I have begun to think of life as a series of ripples widening out from an original center.

The only thing you have to show for a wasted or spent time is that you just realize that you are getting older.

Sometimes I feel like we are the same, but sometimes, like right now, I feel the separation between our personalities like I've just run into a wall.

I am the Mud Hut I Grew Upon

I was just really happy to see Barry [Jenkins] and Mahershala [Ali] and everyone else involved with "Moonlight" get their moment.

You know what happens to girls who loves lost boys? They become lost themselves.

men are not realists - only women are.

To be seen is the ambition of ghosts, and to be remembered is the ambition of the dead.

The difference between film and theater is that in film, an actor is sort of under a magnifying glass and everything that they do, just the smallest movement, is very detectible.

Schools, the first thing they cut is music programs. They don't realize how important music is to kids.

Abundance is about looking at life and knowing that you have everything you need for complete happiness, and then being able to celebrate each and every moment on earth.