“If religion is what gives you hope and purpose, I believe in comedy.”

“What happened was that I caught a glimpse of something I desperately needed to believe in at that point in my life. I wanted to believe there could be something within you that was so essential and so courageous that nothing - no boyfriend, no employer, no trauma - could tarnish or rob you of it. And if you had that kind of unbreakable core, not only would it always be yours, but even in your darkest moments others would see it in you, and help you out before the worse came to the absolute worst.”

“A smart man only believes half of what he hears, a wise man knows which half.”

“I don't believe in money. It's fickle and it's false and it's created poverty in its own name. I do use it though when I need to. But I don't believe it, although I understand a lot of folks do.”

“Hope is not a plan”

“I was foolish because I believed in you. You are a fool because you believe in yourself!”

“For if my poems have always been about survival--and I believe they have been--then survival too keeps revealing itself as an art of the unexpected.”