Still I rise – Maya Angelou

Bloganuary Day 25

Today’s Prompt: What is a song or poem that speaks to you and why?

I love the sassiness of Maya Angelou’s poem “Still I Rise”. Whenever I read it, I read it in her voice simply because I love the way she recited it. It speaks to me on so many levels. I have been bullied. I have cried my heart out because I had not been invited to events by friends to protect the ego of another who was insecure about me. I have been looked down upon because I am a single mum and because I am not rich. Then of course there is the fact that I am a female and a person of colour working in the corporate world in a country where I am not black enough for some and of course, not white enough for others.

When I read this poem, I am reminded that despite all this, I still rise. I am able to stand on my own two feet and create a home for my son as a start. I know I do not do it alone. God has my back and surrounds me with the most amazing people to keep me rising and it is because I have realised this, I can now walk confidently through life.

Still I Rise
BY MAYA ANGELOU

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 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, 
"Still I Rise" from And Still I Rise: A Book of Poems.