The nomad or immigrant who learns something rightly must always ponder travel and movement, just as the grief-stricken must inevitably ponder death. - Edwidge Danticat

My work allows me to exorcise my ghosts. I purge the pain from it. The words are my tears on the page. Perhaps I'd be less serene without it. I tend to be melancholy. The work helps me to put that on the page.

in terms of being immigrants, especially from a place like Haiti, when we see — you know, we see the cholera, we see the earthquake. I think people forget that there’s also this wonderful and powerful history of revolt, of resilience, of resistance, and this wonderful art that’s followed in its wake that has this great beauty to offer to the world.

In the 1980s, when people were just beginning to talk about AIDS, there were just a few categories of those who were at high risk: homosexuals, hemophiliacs, heroin addicts, and Haitians. We were the only ones identified by nationality. Then it seemed from the media that we were being told that all Haitians had AIDS. At the time, I had just come from Haiti. I was twelve years old, and the building I was living in had primarily Haitians. A lot of people got fired from their jobs. At school, sometimes in gym class, we’d be separated because teachers were worried about what would happen if we bled. So there was really this intense discrimination. The FDA placed us on the list of people who could not give blood. So AIDS was something that was put upon us, and we were immediately identified with it. That is unfair. That is unjust. I always say, “We are all people living with AIDS.” It’s not like you can avoid it. It’s part of our world.