Still I Rise
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 back yard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill 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.
Maya Angelou
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What a fabulous poem.
It makes me sad that she didn’t choose to live it, though. When she appeared at the Topeka Performing Arts Center some years ago, a hateful local group that targets Gays, black people, Jews, etc. with picketing and other forms of hate speech threatened to picket her. The Phelps family, a.k.a. Westboro Baptist Church would have picketed outside the theater. They have in fact done this to a large number of events at TPAC. Maya Angelou cancelled her appearance. Her stated reason: she feared violence by black people confronted with the Phelpses’ hate speech. She not only failed to rise, she insulted the very people the poem seeks to praise and uplift, by the fact that she failed to show any confidence in their ability to rise above being baited and taunted — outside the confines of her poem, at any rate. The poem is beautiful, but to me it will always be tainted by her failure to live the truth she conveyed in its words.
Indeed this is an interesting story you tell of her cancellation for such a reason. Though, I don’t read this as a political poem, necessarily. It seems more subjective or personal to her experience. Either way it does remind us that poetry is of and by humans. She is only human. She of course cannot be judged on one decision in Topeka. There are always unknown details in these things. The promoter may have canceled the show on her and then blamed it on the poet who was not there to defend herself. This is common. If ticket sales were low and the threat of violence existed, it may have just been an easy out of financial loss for the theater. Just a thought.
I love this poem. As an artist myself, I know that some days we’re just not up to rising above anything. That’s human and that’s ok. As long as we keep coming back to rise again, we’re true to the spirit of this poem. Those of us who make it, are true.
I feel moved by this whole article, comments included…
there should be more of us out there
“You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I’ll rise.”
Maya Angelou you are
queen of this poem and keep of its
origin I envy your very skill
And hope to someday be able to write
with such talent as yours..