Maya Angelou, the famous African American poet, historian, and civil rights activist who is hailed be many as one of the great voices of contemporary literature, believes a struggle only makes a person stronger.
quote by Michael N. Castle
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Maya Angelou: A Phenomenal Woman?
Me thinks much ink
has been spilt
over the poem;
‘Phenomenal Woman’
by Maya Angelou.
Me thinks it is time
I stuck my oar in
had my say;
hopefully in a far
less controversial way.
So I ask all these supposedly
expert men who
read read read her poem;
then see red red red
who is Maya Angelou?
A Phenomenal Woman?
And to a man these reds do not know?
Do they also not know
that it is personal choice;
which poems poets writers we like?
All have differing tastes
all are entitled to their opinion!
Have they never heard
Maya Angelou recite one of her poems?
It brings a smile to my lips my eyes.
I receive Maya’s performance with pride?
It seems no one nobody does it better?
So again I ask do you know?
Who is Maya Angelou?
A Phenomenal Woman?
Wow what odds would you give
on Maya Angelou, a young
African-American girl
ever achieving?
Phenomenal success?
Maya Angelou had her baby
at age sixteen?
She left home at age sixteen
as a single mother?
This is a very hard road in which seeds
of success could never be sown?
At age three and a half
Maya’s parents divorced.
Her dad sent her to Stamps
Arkansas, to live with
her paternal grandmother.
Four years later, her dad
sent her to San Francisco,
to live with her mother.
Marguerite Annie Johnson
experienced legally enforced
racial discrimination.
As a way of life as a young girl
in the American South.
What odds now on ever achieving
phenomenal success?
What happened to Maya
at age seven eight;
God forbid I will not mention.
When Maya heard
her mother’s boyfriend;
had been killed by an uncle.
Maya felt “her words
had killed the man” and Maya;
fell into a world silent.
Maya “did not speak for five years”
until age thirteen;
reunited with her mother.
Did trauma cause mute Maya
“to go mute for five years? ”
Maya recalled, “I thought if I spoke,
my mouth would just issue out
something that would kill people,
randomly, so it was better not to talk.”
I shall not recite in detail
the story of Maya Angelou’s life.
Best you read it for yourself!
Therefore a brief synopsis;
age sixteen supporting herself her son
working as a waitress cook;
already given up talents for music,
dance, performance and poetry.
Then rebirth as phoenix a phenomenal life!
Time you look her Maya read all about it!
It reads like a suspense novel visual screenplay!
This is phenomenal women exceptional lady!
I shall never know Malcolm X; Dr. Martin Luther King!
So who is this phenomenal African-American women?
“Heralded as a great voice of contemporary literature”!
Maya actress, author, civil rights activist, director, educator,
magazine editor, playwright, poet, producer, singer, song writer...
“three Grammy Awards for her spoken word albums”
Maya Angelou has been awarded over forty honorary degrees!
Other honors include the Women in Film Crystal Award (1992)
Humanitarian Contribution Award (1997)
Inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in (1998)
Among Writer's Digest's “Top 100 Best Writers of the 20th Century” (1999)
Presidential Medal of Arts (2000) , John Hope Franklin Award (2006) , Mother Teresa Award (2006) and the Lincoln Medal (2008) .
International Civil Rights Walk of Fame in (2008)
are but a few of Maya’s honours Maya’s many accolades.
Therefore in genuine sincere respect
I bow the head bend the knee.
And to these critic men these reds
I have but one thing to decree.
What God has seen fit to raise up
let no man attempt to tear down in stupidity.
poem by Terence George Craddock
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I don't call myself a white supremacist. I'm a civil rights activist concerned about European-American rights.
quote by David Duke
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Maya Angelou
Maya Angelou
I like you.
You have a Brave
and startling Truth.
I have the couraged to face
face the loneliness.
Look, I am bold
and straight like you.
Maya Angelou
Im calling you
Im calling through your poem
the earth is listening
the sky is crippling.
Look, Look
Im floating Maya Angelou
I like you
Where are you.
poem by Gajanan Mishra
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I believe we are still so innocent. The species are still so innocent that a person who is apt to be murdered believes that the murderer, just before he puts the final wrench on his throat, will have enough compassion to give him one sweet cup of water.
quote by Maya Angelou
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Passing Thoughts
Do not believe
because you read it in a book
Do not believe
because you saw it on television
Do not believe
because science says so
Do not believe
because a famous person says so
Do not believe
because a wise person believes in it
Do not believe
because your best friend believes it
Do not believe
because everyone else believes it
Do not believe
because others have believed in it for thousands of years
Do not believe
because you've heard it so many times before
Do not believe
because you are told, you must
Do not believe
because others expect you to
Do not believe
because it gets you accepted
Do not believe
because it will make your parents happy
Do not believe
because it will get you noticed
Do not believe
because you want to believe
Do not believe
because you can't afford not to
Do not believe
because it helps you to cope
Do not believe
because you must believe in something
Do not believe
because it makes sense
Do not believe
any of this......
Believe only that, ''you are''
and do not even believe that
for that is,
beyond belief~
poem by Adryan Rotica
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The fact that the adult American Negro female emerges a formidable character is often met with amazement, distaste and even belligerance. It is seldom accepted as an inevitable outcome of the struggle won by survivors, and deserves respect if not enthusiastic acceptance.
quote by Maya Angelou
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The Poet Who No Longer Believes In Himself
THE POET WHO NO LONGER BELIEVES IN HIMSELF
The poet who no longer believes in himself
And writes on anyway-
The poet who is too weak to stop writing-
The poet who has died as a poet,
Before he has as a person-
The poet who may never have lived as a poet-
The old old old schnook,
Still trying to write a poem
And believing he has done it once again.
poem by Shalom Freedman
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Some critics will write 'Maya Angelou is a natural writer' - which is right after being a natural heart surgeon.
quote by Maya Angelou
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I believe that every person is born with talent.
quote by Maya Angelou
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Up until, really, Roosevelt, African-Americans largely voted ninety per cent Republican. That was the political origins, that's what their political voice was in the Republican party. During that history, that last sixty or seventy years of history, the Republican party effectively walked away from the community. They were afraid to really embrace civil rights even though they embraced civil rights legislation. And so it's not enough to just to put it on paper, you gotta actually show up and be in the community, and understand what that struggle was really about.
quote by Michael Steele
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We really are 15 countries, and it's really remarkable that each of us thinks we represent the real America. The Midwesterner in Kansas, the black American in Durham -- both are certain they are the real American.
quote by Maya Angelou
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A -21st -Century Poet
A -21st -Century Poet:
A -21st -Century Poet:
A poet is
a person who liberates 'I' on race, religion, place, time, personal voices
out of greed, anger and ignorance.
A poet is
a person who liberates
obsessive criterion of institutional power and money.
A poet is
a person who respects a variety of cultures,
who creates educational awareness.
A poet is
a person who surely knows himself
of being humanistic to others and himself and knowing
that of liberation from the obsessive humanity
A poet is
a p[erson who makes and builds
a bridge between universalism and worldisms
and walks over the bridge
but
he is already liberated from the concept of
obsessive reality of a bridge.
In order to be profoundly dishonest, a person must have one of two qualities either he is unscrupulously ambitious, or he is unswervingly egocentric.
quote by Maya Angelou
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Manifesto Of Contemporary Poetry(2012)
Contemporary poetry is a junction zone of distilled sky and earth of
(1) .psychology
(2) .philosophy
(3) .ethics
(4) .new aesthetics
(5) .contemporary socio-cultural-economic-moral-political-technolog ical issues reflecting power and knowledge
(6) .initiated knowledeg and creative wisdom of contemporaneity6.moment-to-moment decision making process
(7) .Alchemy between existing contemporary literary theory and working definitions of a practising and operational poet after modernist's literature and poetry
(8) .the end of literary genre concept
(9) .the concept of the continuum-chance, change, revisiting and reconceptualization
and
(10) .Contemplating on quotidian mental and physical experiences.
POET NYEIN WAY
1: 25 pm February 21,2012
Political Arena
It was a political arena that he was in
A political arena where they said he could not win.
He was fighting for the rights of man
Someone had to take a stand.
His religious rights were being denied
They said he was a war activist which was a lie.
He believed in the commandment “thou shall not kill”
They wanted to take away his rights of “ free will”.
So his lawyer went to court, and fought
With everything that he was taught.
He knew he had a battle up ahead
But it was a fight he did not dread.
Civil rights were being denied
Freedom to all should apply.
They went to court the very next day
He knew the jury he would have to sway.
He started debating how he should start
When a deep feeling pierced his heart.
He told the jury: if this had been GODS will
He would have taught us how to kill.
Can you find it in your heart to take another mans life
And leave a person without a husband, family, children, wife.
Those words penetrated deep into their minds.
It did not take them very much time.
“ NOT GUILTY” we the jury do find.
poem by Louis Rams
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MAya
MAya Maya
she came a long way to me
but I found her in my heart
she came a long way to me
but I found her in my soul
she came a long way alone
but she was in; always with me
maya maya she was always indeep
she danced for me
she rose a dream;
for me
she broke the sound
of groan in me
for me
she was a hope
for me
she sang her songs
for me
and gave the freedom
her sound to me
maya the voice of freedom
for me
maya a sound out for me
maya dancer
maya singer
maya lover
great MAya a woman of nation
for nation
every nation
my nation
and she was proud
to be
a woman
[phenomenally]
a woman
she was proud
to be black
AND
make me proud
to be black
maya maya maya maya
the freeman's songs for me
AND[ PHENOMENAL] woman
A devotion of love
for me
MAya
many thanks to you.
MAya.
poem by Sallam Yassin
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John Brown first swam into my vision in the 1960s when I was a political activist in the civil rights movement and the anti-war movement at Chapel Hill, where I went to university.
quote by Russell Banks
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Maya Love
Maya love - maya love,
Maya love is like the sea
Flowing in and out of me
Maya love - maya love,
Maya love is like the day
First it comes, then it rolls away
Maya love - maya love,
Maya love is like the wind
Blowing hard on everything
Maya love - maya love,
Maya love is like the rain
Beating on your window brain
Maya love - maya love,
Maya love is like the stream
Flowing through this cosmic dream
song performed by by George Harrison
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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My life has been one great big joke A dance that's walked A song that's spoke, I laugh so hard I almost choke When I think about myself.
quote by Maya Angelou
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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My life has been one great big joke, a dance that's walked a song that's spoke, I laugh so hard I almost choke when I think about myself.
quote by Maya Angelou
Submitted by Lucian Velea
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