American poet (1928-2014)
Since time is the one immaterial object which we cannot influence -- neither speed up nor slow down, add to nor diminish -- it is an imponderably valuable gift.
MAYA ANGELOU
Wouldn't Take Nothing for My Journey Now
I was raped when I was very young. I told my brother the name of the person who had done it. Within a few days the man was killed. In my child's mind--seven and a half years old--I thought my voice had killed him. So I stopped talking for five years.
MAYA ANGELOU
interview, The Paris Review, fall 1990
Words mean more than what is set down on paper. It takes the human voice to infuse them with shades of deeper meaning.
MAYA ANGELOU
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
I realized that I didn't get here by myself. I am a child of God and that's a blessing and because I have the blessing of God and the knowledge, I have no modesty because it is a learned adaptation. People are just fooling themselves in trying to fool other people when they say, "Oh me! Oh! I'm modest, I can't do this!" I have no modesty, I have humility. Humility comes from inside out and it says, "Someone was here before me and someone has already paid for me." I have a responsibility to pay for someone else who is yet to come, there is no room in there for ego! I am grateful to God. I am grateful to all my people who have helped me and all the ways they've helped me, the teachers, preachers, rabbis, and priests. Everyone that has helped me, I am grateful and I try to help someone else as often as I can.
MAYA ANGELOU
interview, Beautifully Said Magazine, Jul. 2012
We, unaccustomed to courage
exiles from delight
live coiled in shells of loneliness
until love leaves its high holy temple
and comes into our sight
to liberate us into life.
MAYA ANGELOU
A Brave and Startling Truth
Nothing will work unless you do.
MAYA ANGELOU
Facebook post, Jan. 2, 2014
I've learned that making a living is not the same thing as making a life.
MAYA ANGELOU
Facebook post, Mar. 3, 2013
The needs of a society determine its ethics.
MAYA ANGELOU
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
It was wonderful to receive from my President, the Freedom Award and to know that I am a member of the group most recently bought and sold with everybody's agreement, and the people who longed for freedom. When I accepted that award, I thought of all the people who had come from all over the world to find freedom in the United States. I accepted the award for African Americans, every slave who got off every boat, every European, and every Asian who came here searching for freedom.
MAYA ANGELOU
interview, Beautifully Said Magazine, Jul. 2012
Most people don't grow up. It's too damn difficult. What happens is most people get older. That's the truth of it. They honor their credit cards, they find parking spaces, they marry, they have the nerve to have children, but they don't grow up. Not really.
MAYA ANGELOU
interview, The Paris Review, fall 1990
The need for change bulldozed a road down the center of my mind.
MAYA ANGELOU
I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings
Talent is like electricity. We don't understand electricity. We use it.
MAYA ANGELOU
attributed, Black Women Writers at Work
I've learned that you shouldn't go through life with a catcher's mitt on both hands; you need to be able to throw something back.
MAYA ANGELOU
Facebook post, Mar. 4, 2013
Develop enough courage so that you can stand up for yourself and then stand up for somebody else.
MAYA ANGELOU
Facebook post, Sep. 17, 2012
There is nothing so pitiful as a young cynic because he has gone from knowing nothing to believing nothing.
MAYA ANGELOU
attributed, The Truth in Words
Out of the huts of history's shame I rise.
MAYA ANGELOU
Phenomenal Woman
I have a certain way of being in this world, and I shall not, I shall not be moved.
MAYA ANGELOU
Phenomenal Woman
Love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.
A Brave and Startling Truth.
MAYA ANGELOU
A Brave and Startling Truth
The Holy Spirit upon my left leads my feet without ceasing into the camp of the righteous and into the tents of the free.
MAYA ANGELOU
"Our Grandmothers"
Never whine. Whining lets a brute know that a victim is in the neighborhood.
MAYA ANGELOU
Letter to My Daughter