We are traditionally rather proud of ourselves for having slipped creative work in there between the domestic chores and obligations. I'm not sure we deserve such big A-pluses for all that.

I have only to break into the tightness of a strawberry, and I see summer - its dust and lowering skies.

If you want to fly, you have to give up the things that weigh you down.

The function of freedom is to free someone else.

Don’t beg anybody for anything, especially love.

There is no such thing as race. None. There is just a human race - scientifically, anthropologically. Racism is a construct, a social construct... it has a social function, racism.

There is no time for despair, no place for self-pity, no need for silence, no room for fear. We speak, we write, we do language. That is how civilizations heal.

If there's a book you really want to read, but it hasn't been written yet, then you must write it.

In times of dread, artists must never choose to remain silent.

All water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to where it was.

Oppressive language does more than represent violence; it is violence; does more than represent the limits of knowledge; it limits knowledge.

Nobody, said Humboldt, had a destiny. One simply decided to feign one until one came to believe in it oneself. But so many things didn't fit in with it, one had to really force oneself.

We are not to mimic witches spicing their caldrons with a little eye of newt and tail of squirrel when we add Jesus’ name to our prayers.

After eating the world's bread, we wake each morning to remember: We are still hungry. Seek a better loaf. Eat, and never die. Taste, savor, and be filled forever.

The most reliable way to predict the future is to create it.

Good general-purpose manners nowadays may be said to consist in knowing how much you can get away with.

An animal has to suffer for us old-school Latinos to get what we want.

But anyone who's done a musical knows; whether you're dancing or not, physically it's the most difficult thing you can do.

Are those cat hairs on your lapel, or have you been dating a blonde with a crew cut?

You can always cheat an honest man, but it takes more work.

I am silver and exact.I have no preconceptions.