and sometimes I sitdown at my typewriterand I thinknot of so... - Nikki Giovanni

"Art is not for the cultivated taste. It is to cultivate taste."

"I love you because no two snowflakes are alike, and it is possible, if you stand tippy-toe, to walk between the raindrops."

"Writers don't write from experience, although many are hesitant to admit that they don't. ...If you wrote from experience, you'd get maybe one book, maybe three poems. Writers write from empathy."

"the world is not a pleasant place to be without someone to hold and be held by."

"I want to be clear about this. If you wrote from experience, you'd get maybe one book, maybe three poems. Writers write from empathy."