Audre Lorde Quotes

Black women sharing close ties with each other, politically or emotionally, are not the enemies of Black men.

Without community, there is no liberation.

Your silence will not protect you.

Sometimes we are blessed with being able to choose the time, and the arena, and the manner of our revolution, but more usually we must do battle where we are standing.

But, on the other hand, I get bored with racism too and recognize that there are still many things to be said about a Black person and a White person loving each other in a racist society.

But the question is a matter of the survival and the teaching. That’s what our work comes down to. No matter where we key into it, it’s the same work, just different pieces of ourselves doing it.

But the true feminist deals out of a lesbian consciousness whether or not she ever sleeps with women.

If I cannot air this pain and alter it, I will surely die of it. That’s the beginning of social protest.

The quality of light by which we scrutinize our lives has direct bearing upon the product which we live, and upon the changes which we hope to bring about through those lives.

Tomorrow belongs to those of us who conceive of it as belonging to everyone; who lend the best of ourselves to it, and with joy.

You know how fighting fish do it? They blow bubbles and in each one of those bubbles is an egg and they float the egg up to the surface. They keep this whole heavy nest of eggs floating, and they’re constantly repairing it. It’s as if they live in both elements.

When we speak we are afraid our words will not be heard or welcomed. But when we are silent, we are still afraid. So it is better to speak.

The master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house.

In our work and in our living, we must recognize that difference is a reason for celebration and growth, rather than a reason for destruction.

Art is not living. It is the use of living.

You cannot use someone else’s fire. You can only use your own. And in order to do that, you must first be willing to believe that you have it.

I write for those women who do not speak, for those who do not have a voice because they were so terrified, because we are taught to respect fear more than ourselves. We’ve been taught that silence would save us, but it won’t.