Dr. Maya Angelou
Old Folks Laugh
They have spent their
contenet of simpering,
holding their lips this
and that way, winding
the lines between
their brows.
Old folks allow their bellies to jiggle
like slow tamborines.
The hollers rise up and spill
over any way the want.
When old folks laugh, they free the world.
They turn slowly,
shyly knowing the best and worst
of remembering.
Saliva glistens in the corners of their mouths,
their heads wobble
on brittle necks, but their laps
are filled with memories.
When old folks laugh, they consider the promise
of dear painless death, and generously
forgive life for happening
to them.
A Poem by Dr. Maya Angelou
Delivered before the
United Nations
We this people,
on a small and lonely planet.
Traveling through causal space,
Past aloof stars,
across the way of indifferent suns
to a destination where all signs tell us
it is possible and imperative
that we discover A brave and startling truth.
And when we come to it....
to the day of peacemaking,
when we release our fingers
from fists of hostility and allow
the pure air to cool our palms.
When the curtain falls
on the minstrel show of hate,
and faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean.
When battlefields and coliseum no longer rake
our unique and particular sons and daughters
up with the bruised and bloody grass
to lie in identical plots in foreign lands.
When the pennants are waving gaily
When the banners of the world tremble
Stoutly in the good, clean breeze,
When we come to it,
When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders,
and children dress their dolls in flags of truce,
When land mines of death have been removed
and the aged may walk into evenings of peace.
When religious ritual is not perfumed
by the incense of burning flesh,
and childhood dreams are not kicked awake
by nightmares of abuse...
When we come to it.
Then we will confess that not the Pyramids
with their stones set in mysterious perfection,
not the Garden of Babylon
hanging as eternal beauty in our collective memory,
not the Grand Canyon,
kindled in delicious color by Western sunsets,
not the Danube flowing in its blue soul into Europe,
not the Sacred Peak of Mount Fuji
Stretching to the rising sun.
Neither Father Amazon,
nor
Mother Mississippi who,
without favor,
nurture all creatures...
in the depths and on the shores,
these are not the only wonders of the world.
When we come to it
We, this people,
on this minuscule and kithless globe
who reach daily for
the bomb, the blade, the dagger
yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace
We, this people on this moat of matter
in whose mouths abide cantankerous words
which challenge our existence,
yet out of those same mouths
can come songs of such exquisite sweetness
that the heart falters in its labor,
and the body is quieted into awe.
We, this people, on this small and drifting planet
whose hands can strike with such abandon
that in a twinkling,
life is sapped from the living.
Yet those same hands can touch with such healing,
irresistible tenderness
that the haughty neck is happy to bow,
and the proud back is glad to bend.
Out of such chaos, of such contradiction
we learn that we are neither
devils or divines.
When we come to it.
We, this people,
on this wayward, floating body
created on this earth,
of this earth
have the power to fashion
for this earth,
A climate where
every man and every woman
can live freely
without sanctimonious piety
and without crippling fear.
When we come to it.
We must confess,
that we are the possible,
we are the miraculous,
the true wonders of this world.
That is when,
and only when...
We come to it.
A poem by Maya Angelou.
When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safty.
When great trees fall
in forstes,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.
When great souls die,
the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breath, briefly.
Our eyes, briefly,
see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.
Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependant upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their radiance,
fall away.
We are not so much maddened
as we are reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.
And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregulary. Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whispered to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.
home...
Special thanks to dreamer1...
They have spent their
contenet of simpering,
holding their lips this
and that way, winding
the lines between
their brows.
Old folks allow their bellies to jiggle
like slow tamborines.
The hollers rise up and spill
over any way the want.
When old folks laugh, they free the world.
They turn slowly,
shyly knowing the best and worst
of remembering.
Saliva glistens in the corners of their mouths,
their heads wobble
on brittle necks, but their laps
are filled with memories.
When old folks laugh, they consider the promise
of dear painless death, and generously
forgive life for happening
to them.
A Poem by Dr. Maya Angelou
Delivered before the
United Nations
We this people,
on a small and lonely planet.
Traveling through causal space,
Past aloof stars,
across the way of indifferent suns
to a destination where all signs tell us
it is possible and imperative
that we discover A brave and startling truth.
And when we come to it....
to the day of peacemaking,
when we release our fingers
from fists of hostility and allow
the pure air to cool our palms.
When the curtain falls
on the minstrel show of hate,
and faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean.
When battlefields and coliseum no longer rake
our unique and particular sons and daughters
up with the bruised and bloody grass
to lie in identical plots in foreign lands.
When the pennants are waving gaily
When the banners of the world tremble
Stoutly in the good, clean breeze,
When we come to it,
When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders,
and children dress their dolls in flags of truce,
When land mines of death have been removed
and the aged may walk into evenings of peace.
When religious ritual is not perfumed
by the incense of burning flesh,
and childhood dreams are not kicked awake
by nightmares of abuse...
When we come to it.
Then we will confess that not the Pyramids
with their stones set in mysterious perfection,
not the Garden of Babylon
hanging as eternal beauty in our collective memory,
not the Grand Canyon,
kindled in delicious color by Western sunsets,
not the Danube flowing in its blue soul into Europe,
not the Sacred Peak of Mount Fuji
Stretching to the rising sun.
Neither Father Amazon,
nor
Mother Mississippi who,
without favor,
nurture all creatures...
in the depths and on the shores,
these are not the only wonders of the world.
When we come to it
We, this people,
on this minuscule and kithless globe
who reach daily for
the bomb, the blade, the dagger
yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace
We, this people on this moat of matter
in whose mouths abide cantankerous words
which challenge our existence,
yet out of those same mouths
can come songs of such exquisite sweetness
that the heart falters in its labor,
and the body is quieted into awe.
We, this people, on this small and drifting planet
whose hands can strike with such abandon
that in a twinkling,
life is sapped from the living.
Yet those same hands can touch with such healing,
irresistible tenderness
that the haughty neck is happy to bow,
and the proud back is glad to bend.
Out of such chaos, of such contradiction
we learn that we are neither
devils or divines.
When we come to it.
We, this people,
on this wayward, floating body
created on this earth,
of this earth
have the power to fashion
for this earth,
A climate where
every man and every woman
can live freely
without sanctimonious piety
and without crippling fear.
When we come to it.
We must confess,
that we are the possible,
we are the miraculous,
the true wonders of this world.
That is when,
and only when...
We come to it.
A poem by Maya Angelou.
When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safty.
When great trees fall
in forstes,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.
When great souls die,
the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breath, briefly.
Our eyes, briefly,
see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.
Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependant upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their radiance,
fall away.
We are not so much maddened
as we are reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.
And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregulary. Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whispered to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.
home...
Special thanks to dreamer1...
A Poem by Dr. Maya Angelou
Delivered before the
United Nations
We this people,
on a small and lonely planet.
Traveling through causal space,
Past aloof stars,
across the way of indifferent suns
to a destination where all signs tell us
it is possible and imperative
that we discover A brave and startling truth.
And when we come to it....
to the day of peacemaking,
when we release our fingers
from fists of hostility and allow
the pure air to cool our palms.
When the curtain falls
on the minstrel show of hate,
and faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean.
When battlefields and coliseum no longer rake
our unique and particular sons and daughters
up with the bruised and bloody grass
to lie in identical plots in foreign lands.
When the pennants are waving gaily
When the banners of the world tremble
Stoutly in the good, clean breeze,
When we come to it,
When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders,
and children dress their dolls in flags of truce,
When land mines of death have been removed
and the aged may walk into evenings of peace.
When religious ritual is not perfumed
by the incense of burning flesh,
and childhood dreams are not kicked awake
by nightmares of abuse...
When we come to it.
Then we will confess that not the Pyramids
with their stones set in mysterious perfection,
not the Garden of Babylon
hanging as eternal beauty in our collective memory,
not the Grand Canyon,
kindled in delicious color by Western sunsets,
not the Danube flowing in its blue soul into Europe,
not the Sacred Peak of Mount Fuji
Stretching to the rising sun.
Neither Father Amazon,
nor
Mother Mississippi who,
without favor,
nurture all creatures...
in the depths and on the shores,
these are not the only wonders of the world.
When we come to it
We, this people,
on this minuscule and kithless globe
who reach daily for
the bomb, the blade, the dagger
yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace
We, this people on this moat of matter
in whose mouths abide cantankerous words
which challenge our existence,
yet out of those same mouths
can come songs of such exquisite sweetness
that the heart falters in its labor,
and the body is quieted into awe.
We, this people, on this small and drifting planet
whose hands can strike with such abandon
that in a twinkling,
life is sapped from the living.
Yet those same hands can touch with such healing,
irresistible tenderness
that the haughty neck is happy to bow,
and the proud back is glad to bend.
Out of such chaos, of such contradiction
we learn that we are neither
devils or divines.
When we come to it.
We, this people,
on this wayward, floating body
created on this earth,
of this earth
have the power to fashion
for this earth,
A climate where
every man and every woman
can live freely
without sanctimonious piety
and without crippling fear.
When we come to it.
We must confess,
that we are the possible,
we are the miraculous,
the true wonders of this world.
That is when,
and only when...
We come to it.
on a small and lonely planet.
Traveling through causal space,
Past aloof stars,
across the way of indifferent suns
to a destination where all signs tell us
it is possible and imperative
that we discover A brave and startling truth.
And when we come to it....
to the day of peacemaking, when we release our fingers
from fists of hostility and allow
the pure air to cool our palms.
When the curtain falls
on the minstrel show of hate,
and faces sooted with scorn are scrubbed clean.
When battlefields and coliseum no longer rake
our unique and particular sons and daughters
up with the bruised and bloody grass
to lie in identical plots in foreign lands.
When the pennants are waving gaily
When the banners of the world tremble
Stoutly in the good, clean breeze,
When we come to it,
When we let the rifles fall from our shoulders,
and children dress their dolls in flags of truce,
When land mines of death have been removed
and the aged may walk into evenings of peace.
When religious ritual is not perfumed
by the incense of burning flesh,
and childhood dreams are not kicked awake
by nightmares of abuse...
When we come to it.
Then we will confess that not the Pyramids
with their stones set in mysterious perfection,
not the Garden of Babylon
hanging as eternal beauty in our collective memory,
not the Grand Canyon,
kindled in delicious color by Western sunsets,
not the Danube flowing in its blue soul into Europe,
not the Sacred Peak of Mount Fuji
Stretching to the rising sun.
Neither Father Amazon,
nor
Mother Mississippi who,
without favor,
nurture all creatures...
in the depths and on the shores,
these are not the only wonders of the world.
When we come to it
We, this people,
on this minuscule and kithless globe
who reach daily for
the bomb, the blade, the dagger
yet who petition in the dark for tokens of peace
We, this people on this moat of matter
in whose mouths abide cantankerous words
which challenge our existence,
yet out of those same mouths
can come songs of such exquisite sweetness
that the heart falters in its labor,
and the body is quieted into awe.
We, this people, on this small and drifting planet
whose hands can strike with such abandon
that in a twinkling,
life is sapped from the living.
Yet those same hands can touch with such healing,
irresistible tenderness
that the haughty neck is happy to bow,
and the proud back is glad to bend.
Out of such chaos, of such contradiction
we learn that we are neither
devils or divines.
When we come to it.
We, this people,
on this wayward, floating body
created on this earth,
of this earth
have the power to fashion
for this earth,
A climate where
every man and every woman
can live freely
without sanctimonious piety
and without crippling fear.
When we come to it.
We must confess,
that we are the possible,
we are the miraculous,
the true wonders of this world.
That is when,
and only when...
We come to it.
A poem by Maya Angelou.
When great trees fall,
rocks on distant hills shudder,
lions hunker down
in tall grasses,
and even elephants
lumber after safty.
When great trees fall
in forstes,
small things recoil into silence,
their senses
eroded beyond fear.
When great souls die,
the air around us becomes
light, rare, sterile.
We breath, briefly.
Our eyes, briefly,
see with
a hurtful clarity.
Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
examines,
gnaws on kind words
unsaid,
promised walks
never taken.
Great souls die and
our reality, bound to
them, takes leave of us.
Our souls,
dependant upon their
nurture,
now shrink, wizened.
Our minds, formed
and informed by their radiance,
fall away.
We are not so much maddened
as we are reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
caves.
And when great souls die,
after a period peace blooms,
slowly and always
irregulary. Spaces fill
with a kind of
soothing electric vibration.
Our senses, restored, never
to be the same, whispered to us.
They existed. They existed.
We can be. Be and be
better. For they existed.
home...