I swear to the Lord, I still can't see, why Democracy means, everybody but me.

I was a victim of a stereotype. There were only two of us Negro kids in the whole class, and our English teacher was always stressing the importance of rhythm in poetry. Well, everybody knows - except us - that all Negroes have rhythms, so they elected me class poet.

Even the 'Negro' shows like 'Amos and Andy' and 'Beulah' are written largely by white writers - the better to preserve the stereotypes, I imagine.

Writing is like travelling. It's wonderful to go somewhere, but you get tired of staying.

Happiness can only be found if you can free yourself of all other distractions.

My old man taught me a lot of stuff in his death that I don't even know if he would have been able to teach me had he been alive. And that was to never do stuff that can jeopardize the people you love and hurt them.

Death is someone you see very clearly with eyes in the center of your heart: eyes that see not by reacting to light, but by reacting to a kind of a chill from within the marrow of your own life.

Happiness for me is totally just being at peace knowing that, everything I'm doing, God is pleased with that. It's complete peace for me.