53 Quotes About Haiti

She rises- hips ripplingto a silent merenguebearing sloshing vessels homeward,a little water breaking the reliefof dust on her feet-reflectinghow women seemto grip the secret of wringingthe blue cloth of sorrowdry to make wine.-Excerpt from Sandra Sealy's poem "Haitian Water Bearer" in "Chronicles Of A Seawoman: A Collection Of Poems

No, women like you don't write. They carve onion sculptures and potato statues. They sit in dark corners and braid their hair in new shapes and twists in order to control the stiffness, the unruliness, the rebelliousness.

Gods always behave like the people who make them.

The will to make life beautiful was strong.

We are not meant to be in this country. We did not want to come. We were forced to flee or die. Americans perceive desperate brown masses swarming at their golden shores, wildly inventing claims of persecution for the opportunity to flourish in this prosperous land. The view from beneath the bridge is somewhat different: reluctant refugees with an aching love of their forsaken homeland, of a homeland that has forsaken them, refugees who desire nothing more than to be home again.

Nia learned that our self-identity and connection to our roots is so powerful it can impact not only the course of our lives but also that of generations to come.

Style is obviously important in Haiti. A lot of people wore bright colors and neatly pressed shirts. The taxis and billboards were beautiful. Haiti is not afraid of color. And texture. And depth. The young people looked fierce and bored. They looked like pure energy. There was true aesthetic but also a palpable darkness. I mean, let's get real. Kids are slaves here. Kids are bought and sold and put to work.

Anytime one tries to take fragments of one's personal mythology and make them understandable to the whole world, one reaches back to the past. It must be dreamed again.

It never ceases to amaze me that in times of amazing human suffering somebody says something that can be so utterly stupid.