Attend me, hold me in your muscular flowering arms, protect me from throwing any part of myself away.

Your silence will not protect you.

If I didn't define myself for myself, I would be crunched into other people's fantasies for me and eaten alive.

Only by learning to live in harmony with your contradictions can you keep it all afloat.

Black writers, of whatever quality, who step outside the pale of what black writers are supposed to write about, or who black writers are supposed to be, are condemned to silences in black literary circles that are as total and as destructive as any imposed by racism.

I have come to believe over and over again that what is most important to me must be spoken, made verbal and shared, even at the risk of having it bruised or misunderstood.