I'm not a vagrant. . . I'm a hobo. Big difference.
What are the words you do not yet have? What do you need to say? What are the tyrannies you swallow day by day and attempt to make your own, until you will sicken and die of them, still in silence.
African tradition deals with life as an experience to be lived. In many respects, it is much like the Eastern philosophies in that we see ourselves as a part of a life force; we are joined, for instance, to the air, to the earth. We are part of the whole-life process. We live in accordance with, in a kind of correspondence with the rest of the world as a whole. And therefore living becomes an experience, rather than a problem, no matter how bad or how painful it may be.
Oppression is as American as apple pie.
I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood. That the speaking profits me, beyond any other effect. . . . what I most regretted were my silences. Of what had I ever been afraid?. . . Death on the other hand, is the final silence. . . my silences had not protected me. Your silences will not protect you.
. . . my experience with people who tried to label me was that they usually did it to either dismiss me or use me.
. . . and that visibility which makes us most vulnerable is that which also is the source of our greatest strength.
It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.
In the first grade, I already knew the pattern of my life. I didn't know the living of it, but I knew the line… From the first day in school until the day I graduated, everyone gave me one hundred plus in art. Well, where do you go in life? You go to the place where you got one hundred plus.
People love fact-based songs, which is a very funny idea.
I felt like I didn't have [any] pizzazz, and a lot of girls say I'm out of this world, so I was like I guess I'm from Mars.