Quotes from Maya Angelou

There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you.

No, you learned that you have power—power and determination. I love you and I am proud of you. With those two things, you can go anywhere and everywhere.

Whatever was given by Black peple to other Blacks was most probably needed as desperately by the donor as by the receiver. A fact which made the giving or receiving a rich exchange.

The describe my mother would be to write about a hurricane in its perfect power. Or the climbing, falling colors of a rainbow.

They don't give me welfare. I take it.

The idea came to me that my people may be a race of masochists and that not only was it our fate to live the poorest, roughest life but that we liked it like that.

Watch for me and you will see That I'm present in the songs that children sing." People

I am convinced that most people do not grow up [...] I think what we do is mostly grow old. We carry accumulation of years in our bodies and on our faces, but generally our real selves, the children inside, are still innocent and shy as magnolias. We may act sophisticated and worldly but I believe we feel safest when we go inside ourselves and find home, a place where we belong and maybe the only place we really do.

Life had a conveyor-belt quality. It went on unpursued and unpursuing

Forgive yourself for not knowing what you didn't know before you learned it.

Hope is born again in the faces of children. It rides on the shoulders of our aged as they walk into their sunsets. Hope spreads around the earth, brightening all things, Even hate, which crouches breeding indark corridors.

Jimmy Baldwin was a whirlwind who stirred everything and everybody. He lived at a dizzying pace and I loved spinning with him.

The quality of strength lined with tenderness is an unbeatable combination, as are intelligence and necessity when unblunted by formal education

Alone, all alone Nobody, but nobody Can make it out here alone.

Image letting some white woman rename you for her convenience.

There ain't no pay beneath the sun As sweet as rest when a job's well done. I was born to work up to my grave But I was not born To be a slave. One

Then Revered Thomas would being. Blessed Father, we thank you this morning... and on and on and on. I'd stop listening after a while until Bailey kicked me and then I cracked my lids to see what had promised to be a meal that would make any Sunday proud. But as the Reverend droned on and on and on to a God who I though must be bored to hear the same things over and over again, I saw that the ham grease had turned white on the tomatoes.

In our joy, we think we hear a whisper. At first it is too soft. Then only half heard. We listen carefully as it gathers strength. We hear a sweetness. The word is Peace. It is loud now. Louder than the explosion of bombs.

I wondered what they could be laughing about. Whitefolks were so strange. Could they be talking about me?

Imagine letting some white woman rename you for her convenience.

The best candy shop a child can be left alone in, is the library.

But as the Revered droned on and on and on to a God who I thought must be bored to hear the same things over and over again, I saw that the ham grease had turned white on the tomatoes.

Uncle Willie ordered us between licks to stop crying. I tried to, but Bailey refused to cooperate. Later he explained that when a person is beating you you should scream as loud as possible; maybe the whipper will become embarrassed or else some sympathetic soul might come to your rescue.

I couldn't believe that our mother would laugh and eat oranges in the sunshine without her children.