All artists, writers among them, have several stories-one might call them creation myths-that haunt and obsess them. - Edwidge Danticat

We have a Haitian saying: Fanm se poto mitán. Women are middle pillars of society. I think that's true of all societies. I agree to the often quoted maxim that we hold up half the sky. Sojourner Truth, in her famous speech, said that if Eve were able to change the course all alone we should be able to do more together today. Those are the foundations of my feminism, my activism as a feminist/womanist...For a lot of poor families, the men are abroad or the society has crushed them and they're absent for one reason or another. The women may not be labeling themselves feminists or womanists, but they're doing the work. They're keeping the children alive. They're keeping the family going. That's a developed-world, as well as a developing-world reality.

"Do you see my granddaughter?...Isn't it a miracle that we can visit with all our kin, simply by looking into this face?" (chapter 14, p103)

We are ill-favored, but still we endure. Every once in a while, we must scream this as far as the wind can carry our voices. "Nou lèd, nou la!" We are ugly, but we are here! And here to stay.