The white audiences thought I was white, my features being what they are, and at every performance I'd have to take off my gloves to prove I was a spade.

Basically there is no difference between whites and blacks, browns and yellows. I decided to think no more of people as Northerners and Southerners.

Whenever I played Columbus, Ohio, I dropped in to see my close friend, a medium who had mysterious powers. Her Indian guide was Mohawk.

We are all gifted. That is our inheritance.

We never had a bathtub. Mom would bathe me in the wooden or tin washtub in the kitchen, or in a big lard can.

I am somebody cause God don't make no junk

Many people know how to criticize, but few know how to praise.

Only those who are being burned know what fire is like.

Today or any day that phone may ring and bring good news.

There was one emotional outlet my people always had when they had the blues. That was singing.

All the men in my life have been two things: an epic and an epidemic.

Distance yourself from people who:1. Disrespect you2. Mistreat others3. Are abusive4. Lie to you5. Are negative6. Have no goals7. Use you8. Put you down

Is it all just a psychotic dream? What is life?

Somewhere along the line, the crazy youth hostelers I kept seeing everywhere stopped looking so crazy.

You would hardly believe how difficult it is to place a figure alone on a canvas, and to concentrate all the interest on this single and universal figure and still keep it living and real.

I read the same amount of nonfiction and fiction.

People don't remember you for all of the good things you do. They remember the time you blew a giant green snot bubble out your nose.

For example, Michael Jordan earns $100million a year but continues to play basketball and remains a modest human being.

Gradually, they learned that politics is fundamentally a great business, a struggling and a haggling for advantages, over whose lap collects the most rewards cast by the legislation-machine.

What you people call your natural resources our people call our relatives

My only weapon is my pen, I'm a songwriter.