If I want to take a particular form of blues somewhere else I have the equipment to do it but I never even thought of it.

You've got to learn to leave the table When love's no longer being served".

I tell you what freedom is to me: no fear.

What kept me sane was knowing that things would change, and it was a question of keeping myself together until they did.

You can't help it. An artist's duty, as far as I'm concerned, is to reflect the times.

Life is short. People are not easy to know. They're not easy to know, so if you don't tell them how you feel, you're not going to get anywhere, I feel.

You have to learn to get up from the table when love is not being served.

Talent is a burden not a joy. I am not of this planet. I do not come from you. I am not like you.

How do you explain what it feels like to get on the stage and make poetry that you know sinks into the hearts and souls of people who are unable to express it

There's no excuse for the young people not knowing who the heroes and heroines are or were.

Slavery has never been abolished from America's way of thinking.

Love isn't meant to hurt. But if it does, then it is absolutely not a true love.

Only those thoughts which come from walking have any value

The truth is I tried to write for years and I wasn't very good.

Pretty words, as pretty women, wrinkle up and die.

One of the first things that surprised me in a positive, wonderfully positive way, is that this works - patient capital works.

I wish I could lay down beside her and die too.

The name of the Slough was Despond.

Everything distracted me, but most of all myself.

My job is to listen to ideas, maybe cook up a few of my own, and make decisions based on what's good for the shareholders and for the company.

A distribution is just if it arises from another just distribution by legitimate means.