Quotes About Identity

they ask me to remember but they want me to remember their memories and I keep on remembering mine

the lost women I need to know their names those women I would have walked with, jauntily the way men go in groups swinging their arms, and the ones those sweating women whom I would have joined After a hard game to chew the fat what would we have called each other laughing joking into our beer? where are my gangs, my teams, my mislaid sisters? all the women who could have known me, where in the world are their names?

I do not feel inhibited or bound by what I am. That does not mean that I have never had bad scenes relating to being Black and/or a woman, it means that other people's craziness has not managed to make me crazy.

I am a black woman poet and I sound like one.

The literature of America should reflect the children of America.

who among us can imagine ourselves unimagined? who among us can speak with so fragile tongue and remain proud?

these hips are big hips. they need space to move around in. they don't fit into little petty places.

America made us heroines not wives. We hid our ladyness to save our lives

you have your own story you know about the fears the tears the scar of disbelief you know that the saddest lies are the ones we tell ourselves you know how dangerous it is to be born with breasts you know how dangerous it is to wear dark skin

and we hang onto our no place happy to be alive and in the inner city or like we call it home

and this is not the time I think to ask who is allowed to be american america all of us gathered under one flag praying together safely warmed by the single love of the many tongued God

So few people are truly themselves when they're in the spotlight.

Do you seek Alcides' equal? None is, except himself.

Aren't we all monsters inside?

the fact that you'll never know what sort of person you might have been if you'd read different stuff

the fact that maybe men think if they just name everything, everything'll be okay, the fact that it's like dogs marking their territory

the fact that most people live and die where they were born, or they leave home and live somewhere else for decades but come back to pass away, like migrating birds

Ming Dynasty porcelain, Mao jackets, cheap toys and electrical goods, everything, though not pot-stickers, or crispy duck and pancakes and sweet and sour pork and fortune cookies, the fact that she never ate her fortune cookie though, just opened it to see her fortune.

I boiled every equation down to these simple terms: was I lovable or was I ugly?

I was sort of in denial about doing country for awhile but I sort of grew up and realized who I was, what I wanted to say. I think country music is the best music in the world and I'm glad to be doing a country album. I hope people will love it as much as I loved making it.

it will always be different, with your loss part of your new world and personal identity. But that doesn't mean you won't function effectively and meaningfully again, or fully embrace a life full of love and laughter, alongside plentiful memories of those who once stood beside you.

A great many contemporary artists from hugely diverse backgrounds are currently approaching the prospect of cultural mixing...

Ethan: "You think I'm a hero?" Beth: "Yes." Ethan: "But lousy husband material?" Like that really mattered to him. Beth: "Don't sweat it. So was Superman.

I know what it feels like not to fit in, but trying to be like everyone around you doesn't work.