I Look At My Own

Because My Mouth Is Wide With Laughter And My Throat Is Deep With Song, You Do Not Think I Suffer After I Have Held My Pain So Long? Because My Mouth Is Wide With Laughter You Do Not Hear My Inner Cry? Because My Feet Are Gay With Dancing You Do Not Know I Die?

The Only Way To Get A Thing Done Is To Start To Do It, Then Keep On Doing It, And Finally You'll Finish It.

Politics In Any Country In The World Is Dangerous. For The Poet, Politics In Any Country Had Better Be Disguised As Poetry. Politics Can Be The Graveyard Of The Poet. And Only Poetry Can Be His Resurrection.

We Younger Negro Artists Who Create Now Intend To Express Our Individual Dark-skinned Selves Without Fear Or Shame. If White People Are Pleased, We Are Glad. If They Are Not, It Doesn't Matter. We Know We Are Beautiful. And Ugly Too. The Tom-tom Cries And The Tom-tom Laughs. If Colored People Are Pleased, We Are Glad. If They Are Not, It Doesn't Matter Either. We Build Our Temples For Tomorrow, Strong As We Know How, And We Stand On Top Of The Mountain, Free Within Ourselves.

Harriet Tubman Lived To See The Harvest.