“Black children need waves of present, multifaceted love, not simply present fathers.”
— Kiese Laymon
“Your letter reminds me that any love that necessitates deception is not love. It doesn’t matter if that supposed love is institutional or personal.”
— Kiese Laymon
“But i am a black man whose black mama’s body and spirit were terrorized by another black man’s hands and words. Sexism and patriarchy are not part of the revolution. I am a gender-maneuvering gay black man whose spirit was terrorized by other straight black men. Hetero-sexism and heteronormativity are not a part of our revolution. I am a black man who has ignored the plights of so many of my brothers. Separation because of difference and elitism based on class is not a part of the revolution.”
— Kiese Laymon
“This writing thing, it ain’t like that hip hop shit, City. For li’l niggas like you,” he told me, “this writing thing is like a gotdamn porta potty. It’s one li’l nigga at a time, shitting in the toilet, funking up the little space he get. And you shit a regular shit or a classic shit. Either way,” he said. “City, you gotta shit classic, then get your black ass on off the pot.” He actually grabbed my hand. “You probably think I’m hyping you just for the money. It ain’t just about the money. It’s really not. It’s about doing whatever it takes for you to have your voice heard. So I don’t know what you’re writing in that book you always carrying around, but it better be classic because you ain’t gonna get no two times to get it right, you hear me?”
— Kiese Laymon
“We are real black characters with real character, not the stars of American racist spectacle. Blackness is not probable cause.”
— Kiese Laymon
“Obama will win. We will win. Then we will continue to lose. And the right questions will never be honestly asked or answered, and it’s all just too much.”
— Kiese Laymon
“Black is not a vice. Nor is segregation a virtue.”
— Kiese Laymon
“If God needs to condemn anything to hell, it ought to be the idea of social death. Every day we commit an act of revolution, an act of treason, against a system that was never meant to guarantee our survival.”
— Kiese Laymon
“Mama’s antidote to being born a black boy on parole in Central Mississippi is not for us to seek freedom, but to insist on excellence at all times. Mama takes it personal when she realizes that I realize she is wrong. There ain’t no antidote to life, I tell her. How free can you be if you really accept that white folks are the traffic cops of your life? Mama tells me that she is not talking about freedom. She says that she is talking about survival.”
— Kiese Laymon
“The man of courage is not the man who did not face adversity. The man of courage is the man who faced adversity and spoke to it. The man of courage tells adversity, “You’re trespassing and I give you no authority to steal my joy, my faith or my hope.”
— Kiese Laymon
“They are not American super-women, but they are the best of Americans. They have remained responsible, critical, and loving in the face of servitude, sexual assault, segregation, poverty, and psychological violence. They have done this hard, messy work because they were committed to life and justice, and so we all might live more responsibly tomorrow.”
— Kiese Laymon