Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul – and sings the tunes without the words – and never stops at all.

Like a pianist runs her fingers over the keys, I’ll search my mind for what to say. Now, the poem may want you to write it. And then sometimes you see a situation and think, ‚I’d like to write about that.‘ Those are two different ways of being approached by a poem, or approaching a poem.

Our best thoughts come from others.

The spirit is there in every boy; it has to be discovered and brought to light.

O, had I but followed the arts!

I find a lot of inspiration through visuals. When I was 12, I saw Aurora’s ‚Runaway‘ music video. Something inside me clicked, like, ‚That is what I want to do, no matter whether it goes anywhere or not.‘

I don’t think of poetry as a ‚rational‘ activity but as an aural one. My poems usually begin with words or phrases which appeal more because of their sound than their meaning, and the movement and phrasing of a poem are very important to me.

Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.

Efforts and courage are not enough without purpose and direction.

I don’t know how much longer I’ll be around. I’ll probably be writing when the Lord says, ‚Maya, Maya Angelou, it’s time.‘

Every man I meet is in some way my superior.

It is only hope which is real, and reality is a bitterness and a deceit.

Not having hope is not an excuse for not doing something.

We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars.

Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage. If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it. Go out and get busy.

If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can ever warm me, I know that is poetry.

There’s hope for everyone. That’s what makes the world go round.

I need drama in my life to keep making music.

People want to feel hopeful.

Just as our eyes need light in order to see, our minds need ideas in order to conceive.

To me, the most important artists in my career are Arcangel and Balvin. Arcangel gave me the push, the respect in the streets.

Nor shall derision prove powerful against those who listen to humanity or those who follow in the footsteps of divinity, for they shall live forever. Forever.

Tones sound, and roar and storm about me until I have set them down in notes.

America is a poem in our eyes; its ample geography dazzles the imagination, and it will not wait long for metres.

Most poets are young simply because they have not been caught up. Show me an old poet, and I’ll show you, more often than not, either a madman or a master… it’s when you begin to lie to yourself in a poem in order simply to make a poem that you fail. That is why I do not rework poems.

Early on, I was so impressed with Charles Dickens. I grew up in the South, in a little village in Arkansas, and the whites in my town were really mean, and rude. Dickens, I could tell, wouldn’t be a man who would curse me out and talk to me rudely.

I love those who yearn for the impossible.

If you can ask a young man to give his life for his country, you can lead people.

A word after a word after a word is power.

Life loves the liver of it.

The smallest seed of faith is better than the largest fruit of happiness.

My mother is a strong, wonderful woman. I could never be anything she didn’t want me to be.

‚Two Voices,‘ from my album with Peter Schwalm, is an intact dream-poem. I awoke one night with an image of a piece of paper and all the words of the poem written on it, so I just blundered down to the kitchen table and ‚copied it out.‘

When I’m 40 and nobody wants to see me in a sparkly dress anymore, I’ll be like: ‚Cool, I’ll just go in the studio and write songs for kids.‘

Poets utter great and wise things which they do not themselves understand.

Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.

America is not nearly done. We’re only in the beginning. Who knows who we will be? Who knows… what color we will be? It is all something that, maybe, our descendants – if they survive that long – will see.

What keeps me motivated is love and passion.

For me, I used to be shy towards journalism because it wasn’t poetry. And then I realized that the events that I covered in essays that became journalism were actually great because they inspired me, and they became my muse.

Duty, Honor, Country. Those three hallowed words reverently dictate what you ought to be, what you can be, what you will be.

All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling.

Getting a great idea with song writing is a lot like love. You don’t know why this one is different, but it is. You don’t know why this one is better, but it is. It sticks in your head, and you can’t stop thinking about it.

For a true writer, each book should be a new beginning where he tries again for something that is beyond attainment. He should always try for something that has never been done or that others have tried and failed. Then sometimes, with great luck, he will succeed.

The purest and most thoughtful minds are those which love colour the most.

To take a few nouns, and a few pronouns, and adverbs and adjectives, and put them together, ball them up, and throw them against the wall to make them bounce. That’s what Norman Mailer did. That’s what James Baldwin did, and Joan Didion did, and that’s what I do – that’s what I mean to do.

Art is not a treasure in the past or an importation from another land, but part of the present life of all living and creating peoples.

We represent a hustler. I think we represent inspiration. I think we represent, you know, staying down. I think we represent building yourself up from the bootstraps.

And you find as a writer there are certain spots on the planet where you write better than others, and I believe in that. And New Orleans is one of them.

But God can only smile because only God can know what is coming next.

Keep your eyes on the stars, and your feet on the ground.

The world is full of magical things patiently waiting for our wits to grow sharper.

An architect should live as little in cities as a painter. Send him to our hills, and let him study there what nature understands by a buttress, and what by a dome.

When you have peace in yourself and accept, then you are calm enough to do something, but if you are carried by despair, there is no hope.

You have to dream intentionally. Most people dream a dream when they are asleep. But to be a writer, you have to dream while you are awake, intentionally.

Just try new things. Don’t be afraid. Step out of your comfort zones and soar, all right?

Music is not math. It’s science. You keep mixing the stuff up until it blows up on you, or it becomes this incredible potion.

We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.

To live without Hope is to Cease to live.

In the depth of winter I finally learned that there was in me an invincible summer.

Everything is my demon muse. I have a muse which whispers in my ear and says, ‚Do this, do that,‘ but it’s my demon who provokes me.

The most pathetic person in the world is someone who has sight, but has no vision.