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Top 25 Lucille Clifton Quotes (2025 Update)

Lucille Clifton Quote: “What they call you is one thing. What you answer to is something else.”

1. “What they call you is one thing. What you answer to is something else.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “We cannot create what we can’t imagine.”

2. “We cannot create what we can’t imagine.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “In the bigger scheme of things the universe is not asking us to do something, the universe is asking us to be something. And that’s a whole different thing.”

3. “In the bigger scheme of things the universe is not asking us to do something, the universe is asking us to be something. And that’s a whole different thing.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Come celebrate with me that every day something has tried to kill me and has failed.”

4. “Come celebrate with me that every day something has tried to kill me and has failed.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “You might as well answer the door, my child, the truth is furiously knocking.”

5. “You might as well answer the door, my child, the truth is furiously knocking.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Say it clear, and it will be beautiful.”

6. “Say it clear, and it will be beautiful.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Poems come out of wonder, not out of knowing.”

7. “Poems come out of wonder, not out of knowing.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “I write from my knowledge not my lack, from my strength not my weakness. I am not interested if anyone knows whether or not I am familiar with big words, I am interested in trying to render big ideas in a simple way. I am interested in being understood not admired.”

8. “I write from my knowledge not my lack, from my strength not my weakness. I am not interested if anyone knows whether or not I am familiar with big words, I am interested in trying to render big ideas in a simple way. I am interested in being understood not admired.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Poetry is a matter of life, not just a matter of language.”

9. “Poetry is a matter of life, not just a matter of language.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Things don’t fall apart. Things hold. Lines connect in thin ways that last and last and lives become generations made out of pictures and words just kept.”

10. “Things don’t fall apart. Things hold. Lines connect in thin ways that last and last and lives become generations made out of pictures and words just kept.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “All people, even one’s own children, come with baggage. When they’re little, you have to help them carry it. But when they grow up, you have to do that difficult thing of setting their baggage down and taking up your own again.”

11. “All people, even one’s own children, come with baggage. When they’re little, you have to help them carry it. But when they grow up, you have to do that difficult thing of setting their baggage down and taking up your own again.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Every pair of eyes facing you has probably experienced something you could not endure.”

12. “Every pair of eyes facing you has probably experienced something you could not endure.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “You cannot play for safety and make art.”

13. “You cannot play for safety and make art.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “I am a black woman poet and I sound like one.”

14. “I am a black woman poet and I sound like one.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “People wish to be poets more than they wish to write poetry, and that’s a mistake. One should wish to celebrate more than one wishes to be celebrated.”

15. “People wish to be poets more than they wish to write poetry, and that’s a mistake. One should wish to celebrate more than one wishes to be celebrated.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “I don’t go get a poem. It calls me and I accept it.”

16. “I don’t go get a poem. It calls me and I accept it.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Intellect doesn’t translate across cultures; intuition does.”

17. “Intellect doesn’t translate across cultures; intuition does.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “I keep hearing tree talk water words and i keep knowing what they mean.”

18. “I keep hearing tree talk water words and i keep knowing what they mean.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “I think that were beginning to remember that the first poets didn’t come out of a classroom, that poetry began when somebody walked off of a savanna or out of a cave and looked up at the sky with wonder and said, “Ahhh.” That was the first poem.”

19. “I think that were beginning to remember that the first poets didn’t come out of a classroom, that poetry began when somebody walked off of a savanna or out of a cave and looked up at the sky with wonder and said, “Ahhh.” That was the first poem.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “We need new words for what this is, this hunger entering our loneliness like birds, stunning our eyes into rays of hope. we need the flutter that can save us, something that will swirl across the face of what we have become and bring us grace.”

20. “We need new words for what this is, this hunger entering our loneliness like birds, stunning our eyes into rays of hope. we need the flutter that can save us, something that will swirl across the face of what we have become and bring us grace.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “The end of a thing, is never the end, something is always being born like a year of a baby.”

21. “The end of a thing, is never the end, something is always being born like a year of a baby.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “To be a good poet, you must care more about the writing, than the writer.”

22. “To be a good poet, you must care more about the writing, than the writer.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “My Mama Moved Among the Days My Mama moved among the days like a dreamwalker in a field; seemed like what she touched was here seemed like what touched her couldn’t hold, she got us almost through the high grass then seemed like she turned around and ran right back in right back on in.”

23. “My Mama Moved Among the Days My Mama moved among the days like a dreamwalker in a field; seemed like what she touched was here seemed like what touched her couldn’t hold, she got us almost through the high grass then seemed like she turned around and ran right back in right back on in.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “The moon is queen of everything. She rules the oceans, rivers, rain. When I am asked whose tears these are; I always blame the moon.”

24. “The moon is queen of everything. She rules the oceans, rivers, rain. When I am asked whose tears these are; I always blame the moon.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “Children when they ask you why your mama so funny say she is a poet she don’t have no sense.”

25. “Children when they ask you why your mama so funny say she is a poet she don’t have no sense.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “If someone gives you permission, they can take it away. I give myself permission.”

26. “If someone gives you permission, they can take it away. I give myself permission.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “The literature of America should reflect the children of America.”

27. “The literature of America should reflect the children of America.”

— Lucille Clifton

Lucille Clifton Quote: “America made us heroines not wives. We hid our ladyness to save our lives.”

28. “America made us heroines not wives. We hid our ladyness to save our lives.”

— Lucille Clifton

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