“You have a responsibility to live in this world. Your responsibility is not just to yourself. You are connected to everyone.” – Moussa Kaba to Mariame Kaba, ‘We Do This ‘Til We Free Us’

“Fernando, take out the paper that talks; note down what you hear so you can keep all of it in your mind…It must be told. Note it down, Fernando…” – from ‘The Book of Lamentations’

“Little by little, this conjunction of circumstances strengthened Leonardo’s certainty that his power was incontestable and his whims legitimate…” – Rosario Castellanos, ‘The Book of Lamentations’

“Fleeing into fretted sun, he has his reasons. Decoyed and hawked, he fights his battles with moon on his curls.” – “Thunder Road,” Elizabeth Willis

“Any time somebody asks me this I can only shit out an answer, / leave it there, and walk away, ashamed. / I tell her I am a poet.” – Melissa Lozada-Oliva, “I Take Selena to a Poetry Reading”

“It is not down on any map; true places never are.” Herman Melville, ‘Moby-Dick; Or, The Whale’

“The first time I heard two women, a Puerto Rican and a Cuban, say the word ‘nosotras,’ I was shocked. I had not known the word existed.” – Gloria Anzaldúa, “How To Tame A Wild Tongue”

“She’d been utterly lost in the mist before, but she did not bother to consider what she’d do if she should lose her way again.” – Silvia Moreno-Garcia, ‘Mexican Gothic’

“She sat there, at the statue’s feet, and tugged at a blade of grass wondering if someone ever bothered setting flowers inside the mausoleum…” – Silvia Moreno-Garcia, ‘Mexican Gothic’

“we’ll wrap our arms, / my brother and me, // and become / in the surf rising” – Ross Gay, ‘Be Holding’