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We Will Sometimes Have Defeats In Life But You Can Have Defeats Without Being Defeated, You Could Fail Without Being A Failure. When You See Failure And Defeats As Merely Part Of The Process To Get To When.

-Maya Angelou

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We Will Sometimes Have

Maya Angelou

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We Will Sometimes Have Defeats In Life But You Can Have Defeats Without Being Defeated, You Could Fail Without Being A Failure. When You See Failure And Defeats As Merely Part Of The Process To Get To When.

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I Know That You That You May Encounter Many Defeats, But You Must Not Be Defeated. If You Accept That You Have Been Defeated, You Give Power To The Force That Is Trying To Defeat You.

Through The Centuries, We Faced Down Death By Daring To Hope.

You Can't Forgive Without Loving. And I Don't Mean Sentimentality. I Don't Mean Mush. I Mean Having Enough Courage To Stand Up And Say, 'i Forgive. I'm Finished With It.'

Reality Has Changed Chameleonlike Before My Eyes So Many Times That I Have Learned, Or Am Learning, To Trust Almost Anything Except What Appears To Be So.

Nobody Can Enjoy Unless We All Enjoy, Truly Enjoy.

We Are Only As Blind As We Want To Be.

Every Person Needs To Take One Day Away. A Day In Which One Consciously Separates The Past From The Future.

You Can Ask Goodness In, Show It How Much You Like It, Make Room For It. And It Says, "oh, I Like This Place, I Think I'll Stay Here." Which Is Why People Go Into One House And Say, "i Want To Take My Shoes Off." At Another House, No Matter How Beautiful It Is, They Might Say, "hmm, I Can't Stay."

I Wrote Some Of The Worst Poetry West From The Mississippi River, But I Wrote. And I Finally Sometimes Got It Right.

I Long, As Does Every Human Being, To Be At Home Wherever I Find Myself.

It's Wonderful That Whenever Patsy Cline's Name Is Mentioned, People's Voices Fall And They Become Right Sentimental. And, Rightly So.

Therefore We Pledge To Bind Ourselves To One Another, To Embrace Our Lowliest, To Keep Company With Our Loneliest, To Educate Our Illiterate, To Feed Our Starving, To Clothe Our Ragged, To Do All Good Things, Knowing That We Are More Than Keepers Of Our Brothers And Sisters. We Are Our Brothers And Sisters

One Isn't Necessarily Born With Courage, But One Is Born With Potential.

Timidity Makes A Person Modest. It Makes Him Or Her Say, "i'm Not Worthy Of Being Written Up In The Record Of Deeds In Heaven Or On Earth." Timidity Keeps People From Their Good. They Are Afraid To Say, "yes, I Deserve It."

I Make Writing As Much A Part Of My Life As I Do Eating Or Listening To Music.

At One Time, You Could Sit On The Rue De La Paix In Paris Or At The Habima Theater In Tel Aviv Or In Medina And You Could See A Person Come In, Black, White, It Didn't Matter. You Said, 'that's An American' Because There's A Readiness To Smile And To Talk To People.

Hold Those Things That Tell Your History And Protect Them. During Slavery, Who Was Able To Read Or Write Or Keep Anything? The Ability To Have Somebody To Tell Your Story To Is So Important. It Says: 'i Was Here. I May Be Sold Tomorrow. But You Know I Was Here.'

There Is A Very Fine Line Between Loving Life And Being Greedy For It.

Ain't Nothin' To It, But To Do It.

Every Journey Begins With A Single Step.

The Area Where We Are The Greatest Is The Area In Which We Inspire, Encourage And Connect With Another Human Being.

The Thing To Do, It Seems To Me, Is To Prepare Yourself So You Can Be A Rainbow In Somebody Else's Cloud. Somebody Who May Not Look Like You. May Not Call God The Same Name You Call God - If They Call God At All. I May Not Dance Your Dances Or Speak Your Language. But Be A Blessing To Somebody. That's What I Think.

Intelligence Always Had A Pornographic Influence On Me.

All Of Us Knows, Not What Is Expedient, Not What Is Going To Make Us Popular, Not What The Policy Is, Or The Company Policy - But In Truth Each Of Us Knows What Is The Right Thing To Do. And That's How I Am Guided.

The Charitable Say In Effect, 'i Seem To Have More Than I Need And You Seem To Have Less Than You Need. I Would Like To Share My Excess With You.' Fine, If My Excess Is Tangible, Money Or Goods, And Fine If Not, For I Learned That To Be Charitable With Gestures And Words Can Bring Enormous Joy And Repair Injured Feelings.

I Think We Ought To Give Ourselves More Time. We Should Be More Patient With Ourselves And With Each Other.

I Never Have Written Every Day. When I'm Writing A Book, I Write Monday Through Friday. I Always Try To Take Saturday And Pretend To Have Some Sanity.

Music Was My Refuge. I Could Crawl Into The Space Between The Notes And Curl My Back To Loneliness.

There Is No Greater Agony Than Bearing An Untold Story Inside You.

I Sustain Myself With The Love Of Family.

Always In The Black Spirituals There's That Promise That Things Are Going To Be Better, By And By.

I Wouldn't Trade Anything For My Story Now.

I Would Be Stupid Not To Be On My Own Side. But I'm A Human Being, Too. And I'm On The Side Of Human Beings, Rather Than On The Side Of Crocodiles.

I Think A Number Of The Leaders Are, Whether You Like It Or Not, In The Hip-hop Generation. And When They Understand Enough, They'll Do Wonders. I Count On Them.

I Have Great Respect For The Past. If You Don't Know Where You've Come From, You Don't Know Where You're Going. I Have Respect For The Past, But I'm A Person Of The Moment. I'm Here, And I Do My Best To Be Completely Centered At The Place I'm At, Then I Go Forward To The Next Place.

Bringing The Gifts That My Ancestors Gave, I Am The Dream And The Hope Of The Slave. I Rise. I Rise. I Rise.

If A Human Being Dreams A Great Dream, Dares To Love Somebody; If A Human Being Dares To Be Martin King, Or Mahatma Gandhi, Or Mother Theresa, Or Malcolm X; If A Human Being Dares To Be Bigger Than The Condition Into Which She Or He Was Born-it Means So Can You. And So You Can Try To Stretch, Stretch, Stretch Yourself So You Can Internalize, 'homo Sum, Humani Nil A Me Alienum Puto. I Am A Human Being, Nothing Human Can Be Alien To Me.' That's One Thing I'm Learning.

When I Am Writing, I Am Trying To Find Out Who I Am, Who We Are, What We're Capable Of, How We Feel, How We Lose And Stand Up, And Go On From Darkness Into Darkness. I'm Trying For That. But I'm Also Trying For The Language. I'm Trying To See How It Can Really Sound.

I Think All Poems Are Commissioned. They Just Come To Me Without Somebody Outside Commissioning Them. The Idea Comes And I Will Live With Them 'til I Get It As Close To What I Mean. I've Never Been Totally Satisfied. I've Come Close A Few Times.

I Believe We Are Still So Innocent. The Species Are Still So Innocent That A Person Who Is Apt To Be Murdered Believes That The Murderer, Just Before He Puts The Final Wrench On His Throat, Will Have Enough Compassion To Give Him One Sweet Cup Of Water.

When I Am Writing, I Am Trying To Find Out Who I Am, Who We Are, What We're Capable Of, How We Feel, How We Lose And Stand Up, And Go On From Darkness Into Darkness. I'm Trying For That. But I'm Also Trying For The Language. I'm Trying To See How It Can Really Sound.

I've Learned That Whenever I Decide Something With An Open Heart, I Usually Make The Right Decision.

Success Is Liking Yourself, Liking What You Do, And Liking How You Do It.

Oh, The Holiness Of Being The Injured Party.

Poetry Gave Me Back My Voice.

You May Not Remember What A Person Said To You, You May Not Remember What A Person Did To You, But You Will Never Forget How A Person Made You Feel!

I Might Have It At Six-fifteen A.m. Just As Soon As I Get In, But Usually It's About Eleven O'clock When I'll Have A Glass Of Sherry.

Dr. [martin Luther] King Was A Human Being. He Had A Sense Of Humor Which Was Wonderful.

Tell The Truth And Not The Facts.

Telling The Truth

I Am Grateful To Be A Woman. I Must Have Done Something Great In Another Life.

It Is Only Out Of Ignorance That People Are Cruel, Because They Really Don't Think It Will Come Back.

I Am A Very Religious Person, So It Is The Presence Of God, The Constant Unwavering, Unrelenting Presence Of God Which Continues To Help Me To Keep A Character Which I Am Proud To Show.

Indeed We Have Souls. And If A Person Is Religious, I Think It's Good, It Helps You A Bit. But If You're Not, At Least You Can Have The Sense That There Is A Condition Inside You Which Looks At The Stars With Amazement And Awe. That Listens To Water With A River Flowing, Or Water Falling In Rain And Is Lifted Up By That And Listens To A Wonderful Singer, Wonderful Musicians, Listens To Maybe Duke Ellington Or Frank Sinatra Or Listens To Odetta And Mary J. Blige. Yes, And Thinks Whoo! And Thinks, Yes, Hmm, All Right Now. My Soul Has Been Washed. I Feel Better, I Feel Stronger.

When We Know Better, We Do Better.

There's A Place In You That You Must Keep Inviolate. You Must Keep It Pristine. Clean. So That Nobody Has A Right To Curse You Or Treat You Badly. Nobody. No Mother, Father, No Wife, No Husband, No-nobody. You Have To Have A Place Where You Say: 'stop It. Back Up. Don't You Know I'm A Child Of God?

I Thought If War Did Not Include Killing, I'd Like To See One Every Year.

When I Look Back, I Am So Impressed Again With The Life-giving Power Of Literature. If I Were A Young Person Today, Trying To Gain A Sense Of Myself In The World, I Would Do That Again By Reading, Just As I Did When I Was Young.

When I Look Back, I Am So Impressed Again With The Life-giving Power Of Literature. If I Were A Young Person Today, Trying To Gain A Sense Of Myself In The World, I Would Do That Again By Reading, Just As I Did When I Was Young.

There Is Nothing So Pitiful As A Young Cynic Because He Has Gone From Knowing Nothing To Believing Nothing.

Knowing Nothing

Don't Let The Man Bring You Down.

What I Think It Really Means Is: I'm A Teacher. I Am A Teacher. I Teach All The Time, As You Do And As All Of You Do-whether We Know It Or Not, Whether We Take Responsibility For It Or Not. I Hold Nothing Back Because I Want To See That Light Go Off. I Like To See The Children Say, 'i Never Thought Of That Before.' And I Think, 'i've Got Them!'

If A Person - Any Human Being - Is Told Often Enough, "you Are Nothing. You Are Nothing. You Account For Nothing. You Count For Nothing. You Are Less Than A Human Being. I Have No Visibility Of You", The Person Finally Begins To Believe It.

I Don't Trust Anyone Who Doesn't Laugh.

The Idea Is To Write It So That People Hear It And It Slides Through The Brain And Goes Straight To The Heart.

We Need Language To Tell Us Who We Are, How We Feel, What We're Capable Of- To Explain The Pains And Glory Of Our Existence.

I Believe That Each Of Us Comes From The Creator Trailing Wisps Of Glory. So At This Wonderful, Young Age Of 65, I Don't Know Yet What The Lord Has For Me To Do. I Try To Live Up To The Energy And To The Calling, But I Wouldn't Dare Say I Have Even Scratched The Surface Yet.

Being Free Is Being Able To Accept People For What They Are, And Not Try To Understand All They Are Or Be What They Are.

We All Should Know That Diversity Makes For A Rich Tapestry, And We Must Understand That All The Threads Of The Tapestry Are Equal In Value No Matter What Their Color.

When I Was Asked To Do Something Good, I Often Say Yes, I'll Try, Yes, I'll Do My Best. And Part Of That Is Believing, If God Loves Me, If God Made Everything From Leaves To Seals And Oak Trees, Then What Is It I Can't Do?

Never Whine. Whining Lets A Brute Know That A Victim Is In The Neighborhood.

The Trouble For The Thief Is Not How To Steal The Chief’s Bugle, But Where To Blow It.

When The Storyteller Tells The Truth, She Reminds Us That Human Beings Are More Alike Than Unalike... A Story Is What It's Like To Be A Human Being-to Be Knocked Down And To Miraculously Arise. Each One Of Us Has Arisen, Awakened. We Do Rise.

No Sun Outlasts Its Sunset, But Will Rise Again And Bring The Dawn.

We Grow Despite The Horror That We Feed Upon Our Own Tomorrow. We Grow.

And I Not Only Have The Right To Stand Up For Myself, But I Have The Responsibility. I Can't Ask Somebody Else To Stand Up For Me If I Won't Stand Up For Myself. And Once You Stand Up For Yourself, You'd Be Surprised That People Say, "can I Be Of Help?"

I Like Good Food. People Want A Certain Taste, But When They're Offered Something Else, They'll Overeat. If They Really Are Looking For Chicken And Someone Gives Them Pork Chops, They'll Say, "i Will Have Another." And That's Because Their Satisfaction Is Not Reached. So I Thought I Would Make Great Food, But Eat Less Of It. I Tried It And I've Taken Off Over 40 Pounds.

Let The Brain Go To Work, Let It Meet The Heart And You Will Be Able To Forgive.

Faith Is The Evidence Of The Unseen.

Putting Down On Paper What You Have To Say Is An Important Part Of Writing, But The Words And Ideas Have To Be Shaped And Cleaned, Cleaned As Severely As A Dog Cleans A Bone, Cleaned Until There's Not A Shred Of Anything Superfluous.

Some Critics Will Write 'maya Angelou Is A Natural Writer' - Which Is Right After Being A Natural Heart Surgeon.

[librarians] Study Their Field With As Much Determination And As Much Delight As Open-heart Surgeons.

In All The Institutions I Try To Be Present And Accountable For All I Do And Leave Undone. I Know That Eventually I Shall Have To Be Present And Accountable N The Presence Of God. I Do Not Wish To Be Found Wanting.

Your Life Is Much More Important That You Can Imagine... It Is Your First Treasure.

I Believe That Every Person Is Born With Talent.

If You Find It In Your Heart To Care For Somebody Else, You Will Have Succeeded.

If You Do Not Like Anything, Alter It. If You Can Not Change It, Adjust Your Mindset. Will Not Complain.

If On Judgement Day I Were Summoned By St. Peter To Give Testimony To The Used-to-be Sheriff's Act Of Kindness, I Would Be Unable To Say Anything In His Behalf. His Confidence That My Uncle And Every Other Black Man Who Heard Of The Klan's Coming Ride Would Scurry Under Their Houses To Hide In Chicken Droppings Was Too Humiliating To Hear. Without Waiting For Momma's Thanks, He Rode Out Of The Yard, Sure That Things Were As They Should Be And That He Was A Gentle Squire, Saving Those Deserving Serfs From The Laws Of The Land, Which He Condoned.

We All Have That Possibility, That Potential And That Promise Of Seeing Beyond The Seeming.

Human Beings Love Poetry. They Don't Even Know It Sometimes... Whether They're The Songs Of Bono, Or The Songs Of Justin Bieber... They're Listening To Poetry.

I Try To Live What I Consider A "poetic Existence." That Means I Take Responsibility For The Air I Breathe And The Space I Take Up. I Try To Be Immediate, To Be Totally Present For All My Work.

In Spite Of Everything That Was Done To Me And My Race, In Spite Of The Adversity And The Bitter Moments, Again We Rise.

Open Your Eyes To The Beauty Around You, Open Your Mind To The Wonders Of Life, Open Your Heart To Those Who Love You, And Always Be True To Yourself.

Nothing Can Dim The Light Which Shines From Within.

Education Helps One Case Cease Being Intimidated By Strange Situations.

We Really Are 15 Countries, And It's Remarkable That Each Of Us Thinks We Represent The Real America. The Midwesterner In Kansas, The Black American In Durham - Both Are Certain They Are The Real American.

You Have To Deal With What You Encounter. But You Must Not Be Reduced. And So A Way Not To Be Reduced Is Don't Whine! Don't Let The Incidents Which Take Place In Life Bring You Low.

I Am Overwhelmed By The Grace And Persistence Of My People.

I Am A Child Of God. I Always Carry That With Me.

Freedom Is Never Free.

I Became The Kind Of Parent My Mother Was To Me.

Everything In The Universe Has A Rhythm, Everything Dances.

I Couldn't Tell Fact From Fiction, Or If The Dream Was True My Only Sure Prediction In This World Was You. I'd Touch Your Features Inchly. Beard Love And Dared The Cost, The Sented Spiel Reeled Me Unreal And I Found My Senses Lost.

You Are The Sum Total Of Everything You've Ever Seen, Heard, Eaten, Smelled, Been Told, Forgot - It's All There. Everything Influences Each Of Us, And Because Of That I Try To Make Sure That My Experiences Are Positive.

Poetry Is Music Written For The Human Voice.

Home Is That Youthful Region Where A Child Is The Only Real Living Inhabitant. Parents, Siblings, And Neighbors Are Mysterious Apparitions Who Come, Go, And Do Strange Unfathomable Thing In And Around The Child, The Region's Only Enfranchised Citizen.

You May Not Remember What A Person Said To You, You May Not Remember What A Person Did To You, But You Will Never Forget How A Person Made You Feel!

That's What You Want To Do? Then Nothing Beats A Trial But A Failure. Give It Everything You've Got. I've Told You Many Times, 'cant Do Is Like Dont Care.' Neither Of Them Have A Home.

Oh, Black Known And Unknown Poets, How Often Have Your Auctioned Pains Sustained Us? Who Will Compute The Lonely Nights Made Less Lonely By Your Songs, Or By The Empty Pots Made Less Tragic By Your Tales? If We Were A People Much Given To Revealing Secrets, We Might Raise Monuments And Sacrifice To The Memories Of Our Poets, But Slavery Cured Us Of That Weakness.

We Allow Our Ignorance To Prevail Upon Us And Make Us Think We Can Survive Alone, Alone In Patches, Alone In Groups, Alone In Races, Even Alone In Genders.

But Still, Like Air, I'll Rise

The Future Is Plump With Promise.

My Life Has Been Long, And Believing That Life Loves The Liver Of It, I Have Dared To Try Many Things, Sometimes Trembling, But Daring Still.

I'm Not Sure If Resilience Is Ever Achieved Alone. Experience Allows Us To Learn From Example. But If We Have Someone Who Loves Us-i Don't Mean Who Indulges Us, But Who Loves Us Enough To Be On Our Side-then It's Easier To Grow Resilience, To Grow Belief In Self, To Grow Self-esteem. And It's Self-esteem That Allows A Person To Stand Up.

In Order To Be A Mentor, And An Effective One, One Must Care. You Must Care. You Don't Have To Know How Many Square Miles Are In Idaho, You Don't Need To Know What Is The Chemical Makeup Of Chemistry, Or Of Blood Or Water. Know What You Know And Care About The Person, Care About What You Know And Care About The Person You're Sharing With.

When I Say 'i Am A Christian', I'm Not Shouting 'i'm Saved'. I'm Whispering 'i Get Lost'. That Is Why I Chose This Way.

If Somebody Is Really Trying To Take Your Head Off With A Baseball Bat - I Don't Know How Long You're Supposed To Stand There And Turn The Other Cheek, So He Or She Can Get A Better Angle At Taking Your Head Off.

I Don't Trust Anyone Who Doesn't Laugh.

During Bad Circumstances, Which Is The Human Inheritance, You Must Decide Not To Be Reduced. You Have Your Humanity, And You Must Not Allow Anything To Reduce That. We Are Obliged To Know We Are Global Citizens. Disasters Remind Us We Are World Citizens, Whether We Like It Or Not.

Make Every Effort To Change Things You Do Not Like. If You Cannot Make A Change, Change The Way You Have Been Thinking. You Might Find A New Solution.

The Real Difficulty Is To Overcome How You Think About Yourself. If We Don't Have That We Never Grow, We Never Learn, And Sure As Hell We Should Never Teach.

The Real Difficulty Is To Overcome How You Think About Yourself.

I Believe Everything Is Energy. I Believe That The Meal You Serve Yourself, You Prepare, Is Energy. And If You Serve It To Your Family, It's Your Gift Of Energy To Them.

I Try To See Every Day As A Celebration.

A Societies Needs Determines Their Ethics

If You Are Always Trying To Be Normal You Will Never Know How Amazing You Can Be.

Find Something You Like, Go Into A Room, Close The Door And Read It Aloud. Read It Aloud. Everybody In The World Who Likes Dance Can See Dance, Or Hear Music, Or See Art, Or Admire Architecture - But Everybody In The World Uses Words Who Is Not A Recluse Or Mute. But The Writer Has To Take These Most Common Things, More Common Than Musical Notes Or Dance Positions, A Writer Has To Take Some Adverbs, And Verbs And Nouns And Ball Them Up Together And Make Them Bounce.

Try To Be All You Can Be To Be The Best Human Being You Can Be. Try To Be That In Your Church, In Your Temple. Try To Be That In Your Classroom. Do It Because It Is Right To Do.

I Could Fall In Love With A Sumo Wrestler If He Told Stories And Made Me Laugh. Obviously, It Would Be Easier If Someone Was African-american And Lived Next Door And Went To The Same Church. Because Then I Wouldn't Have To Translate.

Falling In Love

I Make Writing As Much A Part Of My Life As I Do Eating Or Listening To Music.

Music Was My Refuge. I Could Crawl Into The Space Between The Notes And Curl My Back To Loneliness.

She Comprehended The Perversity Of Life, That In The Struggle Lies The Joy.

I Can Be Changed By What Happens To Me. But I Refuse To Be Reduced By It.

And If A Person Is Religious, I Think It's Good, It Helps You A Bit. But If You're Not, At Least You Can Have The Sense That There Is A Condition Inside You Which Looks At The Stars With Amazement And Awe.

Hatred Is The Ballast Of The Rock Which Lies Upon Our Necks And Underfoot.

No Not Me Go Find Someone Else To Bring Down

We, Unaccustomed To Courage Exiles From Delight Live Coiled In Shells Of Loneliness Until Love Leaves Its High Holy Temple And Comes Into Our Sight To Liberate Us Into Life. Love Arrives And In Its Train Come Ecstasies Old Memories Of Pleasure Ancient Histories Of Pain. Yet If We Are Bold, Love Strikes Away The Chains Of Fear From Our Souls. We Are Weaned From Our Timidity In The Flush Of Love's Light We Dare Be Brave And Suddenly We See That Love Costs All We Are And Will Ever Be. Yet It Is Only Love Which Sets Us Free.

I'm A Descendant Of Someone Bought And Sold, And Brought In 1619 In What Was To Become The United States.

A Friend May Be Waiting Behind A Stranger's Face.

There Are Those Who Say That Poets Should Use Her And His Art To Change The World. I'd Agree With That, But I Think Everybody Should Do That. I Think The Chef And The Baker And The Candlestick Maker - I Think Everybody Should Be Hoping To Make It A Better World.

The Truth Is, No One Of Us Can Be Free Until Everybody Is Free.

Without Willing It, I Had Gone From Being Ignorant Of Being Ignorant To Being Aware Of Being Aware. And The Worst Part Of My Awareness Was That I Didn't Know What I Was Aware Of. I Knew I Knew Very Little, But I Was Certain That The Things I Had Yet To Learn Wouldn't Be Taught To Me At George Washington High School.

Y’all Dropped The Ball And You Should Be Shamed.

I Speak A Number Of Languages, But None Are More Beautiful To Me Than English.

I Do Hope That Young Men And Women Will Start To Think For Themselves And Start To Take Responsibility For Their Own Thoughts.

It Is The Worst Thing You Can Do, Women, Is Whine, .. I Mean The Worst. Don't Complain, Protest.

To Be Left Alone On The Tightrope Of Youthful Unknowing Is To Experience The Excruciating Beauty Of Full Freedom And The Threat Of Eternal Indecision.

Because Of Technological Breakthroughs, The Society Will Need Fewer And Fewer Unskilled Laborers.

In A World So Rife With Vulgarity, With Brutality And Violence, Love Exists. I’m Grateful To Know That It Exists.

I Have Enough Of Life In Me To Make Somebody Jealous Enough To Want To Knock Me Down. I Have So Much Courage In Me That I Have The Effrontery, The Incredible Gall To Stand Up. That's It. That's How You Get To Know Who You Are.

Yet It Is Only Love Which Sets Us Free.

Love Life. Engage In It. Give It All You've Got. Love It With A Passion Because Life Truly Does Give Back, Many Times Over, What You Put Into It.

People Are Too Busy Putting Things Under Microscopes And So Forth. Creativity Is Greater Than The Sum Of Its Parts.

Jealousy Is Conceived Only In Insecurity And Must Be Nourished In Fear.

I Became The Kind Of Parent My Mother Was To Me.

If We Live Long Enough, We May Even Get Over War. I Imagine A Time When Somebody Will Mention The Word War And Everyone In The Room Will Start To Laugh. And What Do You Mean War?

The Loss Of Young First Love Is So Painful That It Borders On The Ludicrous.

Still, When It Looked Like The Sun Wasn't Going To Shine Anymore, God Put A Rainbow In The Clouds.

I Like To Speak On Matters Which Matter To Human Beings, And Almost Everything Matters To Human Beings.

I Think We Ought To Give Ourselves More Time. We Should Be More Patient With Ourselves And With Each Other.

Growing Up At My Grandmother's Table, She Always Had Rice. She Might Do Something As Exotic As Potatoes Or Spaghetti, But There Was Still Always Rice, Just In Case You Needed A Little Rice Fix.

We Need To Not Be In Denial About What We've Done, What We've Come Through. It Will Help Us If We All Do That.

Surviving Is Important. Thriving Is Elegant.

Precious Jewel, You Glow, You Shine, Reflecting All The Good Things In The World. Just Look At Yourself.

Precious Jewels

If I Wanted To Write, I Had To Be Willing To Develop A Kind Of Concentration Found Mostly In People Awaiting Execution. I Had To Learn Technique And Surrender My Ignorance.

The Music Was My Friend, My Lover, My Family.

Make Every Effort To Change Things You Do Not Like. If You Cannot Make A Change, Change The Way You Have Been Thinking. You Might Find A New Solution.

We Spend Precious Hours Fearing The Inevitable. It Would Be Wise To Use That Time Adoring Our Families, Cherishing Our Friends And Living Our Lives.

The Poetry You Read Has Been Written For You, Each Of You - Black, White, Hispanic, Man, Woman, Gay, Straight.

One Isn't Necessarily Born With Courage, But One Is Born With Potential.

Love Recognizes No Barriers. It Jumps Hurdles, Leaps Fences, Penetrates Walls To Arrive At Its Destination Full Of Hope.

Most People Don't Grow Up. Most People Age. They Find Parking Spaces, Honor Their Credit Cards, Get Married, Have Children, And Call That Maturity. What That Is, Is Aging.

You Can't Really Know Where You Are Going Until You Know Where You Have Been.

Where You Are Going

I Love The Melodies In The Old Testament, How Preachers Highlight Them When They Read From The Scripture. But I Was Influenced Forever By The New Testament. I Love The Beatitudes, Informing Us That The Meek Shall Inherit The Earth.

Listen To Some Good Poetry. You See? It Keeps Us From Thinking We Are Only What Our Blatant Appetites Describe Us As.

You Never Get Over The Fear Of Writing.

To Be Left Alone On The Tightrope Of Youthful Unknowing Is To Experience The Excruciating Beauty Of Full Freedom And The Threat Of Eternal Indecision. Few, If Any, Survive Their Teens. Most Surrender To The Vague But Murderous Pressure Of Adult Conformity. It Becomes Easier To Die And Avoid Conflict Than To Maintain A Constant Battle With The Superior Forces Of Maturity.

If You Have Only One Smile In You, Give It To The People You Love. Don't Be Surly At Home, Then Go Out In The Street And Start Grinning 'good Morning' At Total Strangers.

I Love Living. I Love That I'm Alive To Love My Age. There Are Many People Who Went To Bed Just As I Did Yesterday Evening And Didn't Wake This Morning. I Love And Feel Very Blessed That I Did. I Love, Too, That I Know A Little More Today Than I Did Yesterday, Or I Simply Know It More Profoundly.

Dr. [martin Luther] King Was A Human Being. He Had A Sense Of Humor Which Was Wonderful.

If You're Going To Live, Leave A Legacy. Make A Mark On The World That Can't Be Erased.

Determine To Live Life With Flair And Laughter.

Remember This: When You Cross My Doorstep, You Have Already Been Raised. With What You Have Learned...you Know The Difference Between Right And Wrong. Do Right. Don't Anybody Raise You From The Way You Have Been Raised. Know You Will Have To Make Adaptations, In Love, In Relationships, In Friends, In Society, In Work, But Don't Let Anybody Change Your Mind.

Raising Kids Is Like Nailing Jell-o To A Tree.

If I'm The People's Poet, Then I Ought To Be In People's Hands - And, I Hope, In Their Heart.

Love Liberates. It Doesn't Just Hold - That's Ego. Love Liberates. It Doesn't Bind.

Life Is A Gift, And I Try To Respond With Grace And Courtesy.

I Love Wisdom. And You Can Never Be Great At Anything Unless You Love It. Not Be In Love With It, But Love The Thing, Admire The Thing. And It Seems That If You Love The Thing, And You Don't Just Want To Possess It, It Will Find You.

There Are Great Parents Of Small Children - They Keep Their Little Hair In Bows - But Those Parents Are Not Always Good Parents Of Young Adults. As Soon As Their Children Get Up To Some Size, It's "shut Up, Sit Down, You Talk Too Much, Keep Your Distance, I'll Send You To Europe!" My Mom Was A Terrible Parent Of Small Children But A Great Parent Of Young Adults. She'd Talk To Me As If I Had Some Sense.

And If A Person Is Religious, I Think It's Good, It Helps You A Bit. But If You're Not, At Least You Can Have The Sense That There Is A Condition Inside You Which Looks At The Stars With Amazement And Awe.

When Someone Shows You Who They Are, Believe Them The First Time.

It Is Better To Control Oneself, If One Can, And Not Hit Back. But On Certain Occasions, It Is Imperative To Defend Oneself. I Don't Think It's Fair To Ask Anybody Not To Defend Herself Or Himself.

I've Learned That Whenever I Decide Something With An Open Heart, I Usually Make The Right Decision.

All Great Artists Draw From The Same Resource: The Human Heart, Which Tells Us That We Are All More Alike Than We Are Unalike.

My Grandmother Told Me That Every Good Thing I Do Helps Some Human Being In The World. I Believed Her 50 Years Ago And Still Do.

You Don't Want Modesty, You Want Humility. Humility Comes From Inside Out. It Says Someone Was Here Before Me And I'm Here Because I've Been Paid For. I Have Something To Do And I Will Do That Because I'm Paying For Someone Else Who Has Yet To Come.

Mostly, What I Have Learned So Far About Aging, Despite The Creakiness Of One's Bones And Cragginess Of One's Once-silken Skin, Is This: Do It. By All Means, Do It.

In The 16th Century, [niccolò] Machiavelli - In An Attempt To Get Back In The Good Graces Of The Powerful - Wrote A Slim Volume Called The Prince. In That Book He Showed The Powers That Be How To Control The People. That Book Is A Statement: Separate And Rule, Divide And Conquer. That's Five Hundred Years Ago And It Still Works, Because We Allow Ourselves To Be Lead Around With Holes Through Our Noses.

My Great Hope Is To Laugh As Much As I Cry; To Get My Work Done And Try To Love Somebody And Have The Courage To Accept The Love In Return.

I Want To Write So Well That A Person Is 30 Or 40 Pages In A Book Of Mine ... Before She Realizes She's Reading.

No One Has Ever Become Poor From Giving.

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