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Stephanie Lynn May 2014
My heart is heavy today at the loss of such an incredible inspiration to the arts community. Her poetry is the reason I was inspired to write, to be who I am destined to be, and to always live and fight for what I believe in. Maya Angelou wasn't just a poet, she was a movement, providing never ending insight and knowledge to the community and marching along with us during the civil rights. Maya Angelou, what a dent your absence will leave behind, but what a beautiful picture painted words you have left us. I had always dreamed of meeting you one day, but now I know that day will never come (at least in the physical world anyway). Thank you Maya Angelou for your knowledge, your strength, and your never ending guidance. You showed us the world through a different pair of eyes and it is that reason I now know why the caged bird sings!

Rest Peacefully Dr. Maya Angelou!
On the day
I was baptized,
I sat in the back pew
of my church,
weeping.

It took a long time
for me to arrive
on the bank
of the
River Jordan
that Day of
All Saints.

Flanked by my
two young sons
also getting
dipped
that day,
moved
me to
solemn
tears;
humbled
that I
would wade
into the living
waters
with my sons
as brothers
in the
Living
Christ.

My fount
of tears
rolled
cause
I finally
arrived
as one of
Gods
own.

Today
I saw
Maya Angelou
weep.

She received
The Presidential
Medal of Freedom.

She sat while the
President placed
it around her neck.

She did not rise to
receive it.

I think she was
sitting in a wheelchair.

She looked tired
but she was not feeble.

She was humble
yet remained unbowed.

Her eyes were closed
as they read a citation
about her; yet I know
her vision remains
keen.

She did not look up.

She quietly wept.

The President kissed
her cheek after
he clasped the award
around her neck.

Maya Angelou
never
looked up.

She just
wept.

Maya,
fellow award
recipient
John Lewis
and
their
son
Barack
Obama
have
arrived;
sitting at
America's
table
of freedom,
as
Maya Angelou
gently
weeps.


2/15/11
Oakland
jbm
Maggie Emmett Nov 2016
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I’ll rise.

Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
‘Cause I walk like I’ve got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.

Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I’ll rise.

Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries?

Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don’t you take it awful hard
‘Cause I laugh like I’ve got gold mines
Diggin’ in my own backyard.

You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may **** me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.

Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I’ve got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?

Out of the huts of history’s shame
I rise
Up from a past that’s rooted in pain
I rise
I’m a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.

Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that’s wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts that my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
From And Still I Rise by Maya Angelou. Copyright © 1978 by Maya Angelou.
Having seen the dreadful remarks made on Social Media about USA President's wife, Michelle Obama I think this poem is worth re-reading
unnamed Dec 2014
Still I Rise by Maya Angelou
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
Still I Rise by Maya Angelou
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
I don’t want to read anything about or

or from Maya Angelou

I don’t want.

I don't want to be sad

I know she must have been an amazing person

No, she had to be an amazing person

but I only heard her name once or twice

once or twice

in my life time, in her life time

So I don’t want to be sad that she is gone

That I never knew her

I don’t want to be sad

I don't want to be sad about not reading her material when she was alive.

Not knowing

I just don’t want to feel that way

Not knowing her

Rest in peace, beautiful human being.
Ivan Brooks Sr Aug 2018
African woman
Mother of civilization.
Oh beautiful woman,
Thou are beyond description.

African woman
Queen of the people of Mamba.
Jambo to all those in heaven
Bless you too my dear mama.

African woman
Royal Nubian Queen.
The backbone of her man
You'll do anything to help him win.

Single Black woman
Made of broken pieces
You're the breadwinner,Superwoman.
You're the symbol of strength in all places.

African woman
Daughter of Eve's.
Thou are God's true specimen,
And the apple of his eyes.

Black woman
Daughter of Africa.
Blueprint of a **** woman,
Dark hue of coffee arabica.

African woman
Mother of humanity
Chieftess of ancient Nyngoman,
Mama Africa's bounty.

African woman
My Mandingo bride.
First woman of Africa's Eden
Center of God's black tribe.

Nigerian woman
My Yoruba Queen.
Envied by the women of Oman,
Cafe ou lair, cream of Africa's cream!

Warrior woman,
Queen of Wakanda.
Come and flip your wand,
Find the soul of Sarafina.

Curvy woman
In your womb lies Africa's future.
My Lormah woman
Oyobuays marvels at your structure.

Beautiful woman,
Perpetual envy of the silicon woman.
Pride of the Black man,
The essence of a real woman.

Indigo Woman
Lillies of the African plains.
Thou are Eve of the African Eden,
Best of the portraits that nature paints.

Voluptous woman,
Full, thick natural lips.
Real assert of the Black woman,
Nature gets aroused by your hips.

Ellen Sirleaf, today's woman,
Africa's first female president.
A Liberian woman,
Loved and revered wherever she went.

Smile ,Gambian woman,
You're daughter of Sarakunda.
Roots of the Black American woman,
Captives of the kanda Bolinga.

South African woman
Mariam Makeba
Sang for freedom and fought like a man
You were truly Soweto's finest Deva.

Dark ebony woman,
You are red, yellow and green.
Hanmatan wind stops at your command,
Born to slay and be seen.

African woman
Thou are the only reason
God put Adam in a coma.
Your perpetual beauty transcends time and Season.

African woman,
Under your cleavage, the Nile flows
And between your fingers, golden threads are woven,
You are the reason Beyonce glows.

Harriet Tubman, brave woman
Smuggled slaves underground.
She was a freed Black slave woman,
Who avowed to leave no soul behind.

Creative woman
Maya Angelou, gifted poetess.
Famous writer and a Black woman
Will be remembered for her poetic prowess.

Native African woman,
Africa's limestone and cement.
A mother, a wife, virtuous woman,
Lioness and the spine of the continent.

Liberian woman
Roots of my poetry, you gave me life
You are every woman.
Your edges are sharper than the Sumarais knife.



#IvanBrookspoetry©
13/8/2018
For mama and all the black Queens.
Ben Ditmars May 2014
I wrote a tribute to Maya Angelou in 2010 that I would like to share today in memory of a great poet. Please excuse the dated references.

I Know Why the Twitter Bird Tweets

The free bird leaps
on Google’s back
and scrolls down page
till the browser ends
and dips his wings
in Facebook rays
and dares to claim the internet.

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow page
can seldom see through
his lists of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his claws to tweet.

The Twitter bird tweets
with fearful trill
of the things unknown
but longed for still
and his tweet are read
on the distant hill
for the Twitter bird
tweets of freedom

The free bird may watch tivo'd Glee
And order up some good Chinese
and laugh as Sue Sylvester drones
On and on of kids off tone.

But Twitter bird stands on the grave of tweets
Getting “trends” for Trick or Treat
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his claws to tweet.

The Twitter bird tweets
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tweet is heard
on the distant hill
for the Twitter bird
tweets of freedom.
M IS FOR MAYA A WOMAN OF GREAT RESPECT.  SHE HAD A WAY OF COMFORTING YOU, UPON BEING UPSET.
A IS FOR ABILITY SHE USED TO WRITE POETRY, AS IT CAME INTO HER HEAD.  SHE NEED SOMEONE TO CARRY THE TORCH, NOW THAT SHE IS DEAD.
Y IS FOR YOUTHFULNESS, EVEN THE YOUNG PEOPLE CANNOT HIDE.  JUST TO BE AROUND THEM, PRODUCED HAPPY TEARS IN HER EYES.
A IS FOR  AUTHORITY THAT SHE POSSESSED,  AS SHE PROUDLY WALKED BOLD.  THERE WAS NOTHING ABOUT MAYA ANGELOU, THAT CAME ACROSS AS COLD.
ANGELOU IS HER LAST NAME, EVEN THE PRESIDENT RECOGNIZE.  SHE WAS THAT TYPE OF WOMAN, HE WOULD HAVE STAND BY HIS SIDE.
BY, SANDRA JUANITA NAILING
An African sunset has once again,
not outlived darkness of its own sunset,
but the legacy of its poetry will soon
Set forth the new dawn in full brightness
Of the phenomenal African woman
Whose desire to sire human freedom
Irritatingly sings and will ever sing like
A bird in the cage of oppressor’s ploy
Singing the songs of freedom for all,
Invoking ears of the heart in mental realm
Of prejudice and bigoted self-exclusion
to see the self in the face of otherness.


I mourn Dr. Angelou Maya who passed on,
On the black Wednesday of may 2014,
A doomsday of dooms-month of dooms-year,
That extended the invisible tentacles of death
To curtail the breathes African daughter,
At the Wake Forest University, in land of the Yankees,
At her only ****** age of 8 and 6 compartments
Of twelve months swelling not even full in each case,
Leaving me to wonder in my African callousness,
At the magical reality in the sharp sounded words;
Of , O death!  O death! Why are you so untimely?
That echoed from whale rapacious jaws in the mandibles
Of capitalism that ruthlessly converts nature into ***** money
In the erstwhile onset of the dawn for new morning.


I mourn with grief, my dear sister; Dr. Angelou Maya,
She boldly stood up in the fullness of her melanin
Pronouncedly **** and elegant gap in her front teeth,
Blending to overwhelm the entire world with the beauty,
In the darkness of her African skin, provoking evil
Of the time, that let a white man to **** her
A Poor daughter of the an ex-slave in Americas,
And the ****** walked away scot-free at the helm of
Evil freedom in the apartheid civilization of the USA, as her humane
Heart forgave him, the white ******, seven times and seventy seven
occasions, a reflection of true piousness, true humanism,
Like a phoenix she still stood up, her head in fortitude like a tor,
as we the conquered and the enslaved  ones sat forlorn,
in the ******* of fierce slavery, at the nub of salve anguish
in the pangs of  nostalgia for  the banks of River Congo,
Yearning in equanimity for the life by the waters of the River Nile,
she had to rise indomitably  and sing for civil rights of the black souls,
Terrorized by the evils and wiles of Ku Klux ****, handmaiden
by the Jimmy Crow cultures in the days of Rosa Parks,
She sang tunes, lyrics and poor folks’ ballads together
with Luther King Jnr., Malcolm X and entire Negritude,
When we lived as slaves in the land of abundance,
Caged in the pigeonholes of black ghettoes
Mushrooming the entire Harlem in which
she were born, dear begotten daughter of Africa,
You rose and sang songs of liberty when the world
Was mum on the violations of gender,
Is when your thespic power in your magical
And surreal words, created the truth
In the phenomenon of phenomenal woman
That finds honour in un-bowing before the thrones
Of those who reign by perpetrating terror.
.

— The End —