Nikki Giovanni quotes: wise famous quotes, sayings and quotations by Nikki Giovanni

Nikki Giovanni Famous Quotes & Sayings

Discover top inspirational quotes from Nikki Giovanni on Wise Famous Quotes.

The only way you can grow is to let yourself make mistakes and create contradictions. As we learn new things, some of our old attitudes will change.

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

If i can't have what i want ... then my job is to want what i've got and be satisfied that at least there is something more to want

The catchword I use with my classes is: The authority of the writer always overcomes the skepticism of the reader.

Black love is Black wealth and they'll probably talk about my hard childhood and never understand that all the while I was quite happy

FOR SONIA SANCHEZ

The ability to take pride in your own work is one of the hallmarks of sanity.

A lot of people refuse to do things ...

There're two people in the world that are not likeable: a master and a slave.

Sometimes
when i wake up
in the morning
and see all the faces
i just can't
breathe
from Sometimes

A white face goes with a white mind. Occasionally a black face goes with a white mind. Very seldom a white face will have a black mind.

Sacred cows make very poor gladiators.

When younger, I thought one of the particulars of being "Homo sapiens" was to communicate. I have not learned not to, though I am cautious when I try.

Fanatics are, for one thing, boring and, for another, unreliable. They tend to burn out just when you need them.

We have a world to conquer ... one person at a time ... starting with ourselves.

If you don't understand yourself you don't understand anybody else.

She knows who she is, because she knows who she isn't.

Show me someone not full of herself and I'll show you a hungry person.

If now isn't a good time for the truth I don't see when we'll get to it.

I am cotton candy on a rainy day
the unrealized dream of an idea unborn

from Cotton Candy on a Rainy Day

What's the difference between dragging a black man behind a truck in Jasper, Texas, and beating a white boy to death in Wyoming because he's gay?

Educational progress is a national concern; education is a private one.

Poems don't have to rhyme. Poems are about beauty and emotion; in other words poems are about feelings.

I'm glad I understand that while language is a gift, listening is a responsibility. (U.S. poet and writer, 1943- )

We are all more than our experiences
And less than our dreams
~ from "I Am Glass

Everybody that loves freedom loves Harriet Tubman because she was determined not only to be free, but to make free as many people as she could.

All systems require myths for their longevity.

Mistakes are a fact of life: It is the response to the error that counts.

Poetry and music are very good friends. Like mommies and daddies and strawberries and cream - they go together.

I've not learned the acceptable way of saying you fascinate me ... I've not even learned how to say I like you without frightening people away-

We cannot leave it to history as a discipline nor to sociology nor science nor economics to tell the story of our people

One stands, in fact, in awe of the Constitution of the United States, though it is an idea and not quite a reality.

For most of my life, I've thought of myself as pretty cool.

Nothing is easy to the unwilling.

Everything will change. The only question is growing up or decaying.

Poetry is motion graceful
as a fawn
gentle as a teardrop
strong like the eye
finding peace in a crowded room

We in the Black Arts movement, which wasn't really a movement but a group of people who had similar objectives ...

I always like summer
best

God knows it's a sign of a really sick mind to see grown people, adults with responsibilities, wearing class rings.

It is not unusual to sift
through ashes
and find an unburnt picture

You must invent your own games and teach us old ones how to play.

There are things you stand up for because it's right.

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

I think speeches and fruit should always be fresh.

Ever been kidnapped by a poet if i were a poet i'd kidnap you put you in my phrases and meter ...

There are some things we do simply because the doing is a success.

But nonviolence was never for the oppressor; it was for the oppressed.

We eat up artists like there's going to be a famine at the end.

We are less lonely when we connect. Art is connection.

History is wonderful. We have so much we can learn if we would quit making ideology out of history, and just deal with what happened.

I spend a lot of time learning about bird watching.

If you're a writer, the answer to everything is yes.

Poets should be ashamed
To die
Before they kiss
The sun

White people really deal more with God and black people with Jesus.

If I could come back as anything - I'd be a bird, first, but definitely the command key is my second choice.

The unwillingness to try is worse than any failure.

And i've begun
(as a reaction to a feeling)
to balance
the pleasure of loneliness
against the pain
of loving you
from Balances

We are better than we think and not yet what we want to be.

I don't have a life-style, I have a life.

Poetry is the most mistaught subject in any school because we teach poetry by form and not by content.

I prefer her [Nina Simone] jazz period much more so than her folk period.

We believe 'Peter Rabbit' because Beatrix Potter believes it. You have to.

I'm just totally fascinated by people.

I think one of the nicest things that we created as a generation was just the fact that we could say, 'Hey, I don't like white people.'

We obviously need the truth. We're living in a country of lies.

Photographers direct the eye toward a particular object. We who write, one hopes, are directing the heart and the soul.

Don't want to be near you for the thoughts we share but the words we never have to speak.

Favorite poems are like favorite children. We definitely have them but we never tell as the others would have their feelings hurt.

Just as nature abhors a vacuum, humans resist change. Change will occur; vacuums will be filled.

Black love is black wealth

It is not who you attend school with but who controls the school you attend.

Floating to shore ... riding a low moon ... on a slow cloud.

Black Poetry is not for Black People ... it is for everybody

I move on feeling and have learned to distrust those who don't.

Now, everything I do, I do because I want to. And I believe the best is yet to come.

If everybody became a poet the world would be much better. We would all read to each other.

Deal with yourself as a individual, worthy of respect and make everyone else deal with you the same way.

Hip-hop is a cultural expression - it's embracing.

I am a huge fan of the Black woman. I never hesitate to recommend her when times are bad or things go wrong.

Life is a marvelous, transitory adventure.

Violence is like money in the bank; it's only helpful if you don't have to use it.

Follow your image as far as you can no matter how useless you think it is. Push yourself.

Baseball is already the world's most tranquil sport. It is probably the only active sport where you are not seriously required to be alive to play.

Daddy says the world is a drum tight and hard and i told him i'm gonna beat out my own rhythm

We write because we believe the human spirit cannot be tamed and should not be trained.

If you know what you're talking about, or if you feel that you do, the reader will believe you.

I would put books on par with chocolate, because a good book is delicious.

I appreciate and enjoy my age.

BEFORE YOU JUMP OFF A BRIDGE OR HANG YOURSELF OR BE UNHAPPY PLEASE CONSIDER: LIVE FOR YOURSELF; THOSE WHO HATE YOU HAVE NO PURCHASE

No one needs to teach you to be mean; we need to be taught to be kind.

And you will understand all too soon
That you, my children of battle, are your heroes

I was responding to one thing for the woman I knew, and there's another thing for what did she give, right. She [Nina Simone] was a great teacher.

In the name of peace
They waged the wars
ain't they got no shame

Art offers sanctuary to everyone willing to open their Hearts as well as their Eyes.

If I can't do what I want to do, then my job is to not do what I want to do. It's not the same thing, but it's the best thing I can do.

Life is a process where people mix and match, fall apart and come back together.

Who I really am keeps surprising me.

Libraries ... house our dreams.

I hope that, reading 'Rosa,' people will remember their own family and friends and talk about what they did and did not do.

I am honest; I try to be truthful. I like people and wish us well. We are not always deserving of our own best wishes.