“When there is pain, there are no words. All pain is the same.”

I didn’t want to speak for black people. I wanted to speak to and to be among. It’s us.

I’ve spent my entire writing life trying to make sure that the white gaze was not the dominant one in any of my books.

Definitions belong to the definers, not the defined.

Lonely was much better than alone.

Anything dead coming back to life hurts.

I type in one place, but I write all over the house.

There is an incredible amount of magic and feistiness in black men that nobody has been able to wipe out. But everybody has tried.

Writing is really a way of thinking–not just feeling but thinking about things that are disparate, unresolved, mysterious, problematic or just sweet.

There is really nothing more to say-except why. But since why is difficult to handle, one must take refuge in how.

I get angry about things, then go on and work.

As you enter positions of trust and power, dream a little before you think.

You need a whole community to raise a child. I have raised two children, alone.

You are your own stories.

I don’t think one parent can raise a child. I don’t think two parents can raise a child. You really need the whole village.

But to find out the truth about how dreams die, one should never take the word of the dreamer.

He wants to put his story next to hers.

Gonna be a twister to blow everything down That ain’t got the faith to stand its ground. Blow away the dreams that tear you apart. Blow away the dreams that break your heart. Blow away the lies that leave you nothing but lost and brokenhearted.

Summer came and summer went and I never saw your eyes again.

Can someone tell the birds she’s gone. They’re still singing for her and it’s breaking what’s left of my heart.

How hard it must be to love someone so broken.

I build a world inside you I shattered when you left and took it with you.

Truth- I am broken. Dare- Love me anyway.

Maybe there’s a world out there where you and I find each other and it doesn’t end in burning flames or broken hearts.

Some days, all of it aches with beauty.  Others, it all just aches with you.