There was a possibility that God really did love me, me Maya Angelou. I suddenly began to cry at the gravity and grandeur of it all. I knew that if God loved me, then I could do wonderful things, I...

Graduation, the hush-hush magic time of frills and gifts and congratulations and diplomas, was finished for me before my name was called. The accomplishment was nothing. The meticulous maps, drawn in...

I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.

I was basically good. Not understood, and not even liked, but even so, just, and better than just. I was merciful.

Water isn't shaped like a river or ocean; it mists invisibly against metal and glass

I want you to learn that you cannot have anything without working for it. The only way you can be taken advantage of is if you think you can get something for nothing.

You said to lean on your armAnd I am leaning You said to trust in your loveAnd I am trusting You said to call on your name And I am calling I'm stepping out on your word

When I find myself filling with rage over the loss of a beloved, I try as soon as possible to remember that my concerns and questions should be focused on what I learned or what I have yet to learn...

Preach it, I say preach it.

Those are facts, but facts, to a child, are merely words to memorize.

Of all the needs {there are none imaginary} a lonely child has, the one that must be satisfied, if there is going to be hope and a hope of wholeness, is the unshaking need for an unshakable God. My...

She said that I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy.

My mother raised me, and then freed me

Independence is a heady draft, and if you drink it in your youth, it can have the same effect on the brain as young wine does. It does not matter that its taste is not always appealing. It is...

One person, with good purpose, can, constitute the majority.

He thrived with passion and compassion, humor and style. We had him whether we know who he was or did not know, he was ours and we were his.

Imagine, I might really become somebody. Someday.

We are missing Michael.But we do know we had him, and we are the world.

I walk into a roomJust as cool as you please,And to a man,The fellows stand orFall down on their knees.

I am never proud to participate in violence, yet, I know that each of us must care enough for ourselves, that we can be ready and able to come to our own defense when and wherever needed.

Oh, Black known and unknown poets, how often have your auctioned pains sustained us? Who will compute the lonely nights made less lonely by your songs, or by the empty pots made less tragic by your...

See, you don't have to think about doing the right thing. If you're for the right thing, then you do it without thinking.

Can't Do is like Don't Care. Neither of them have a home.

I had read a Tale of Two Cities and found it up to my standards as a romantic novel. She opened the first page and I heard poetry for the first time in my life... her voice slid in and curved down...

The dread of futility has been my life-long plague.

As I ate she began the first of what we later called my lessons in living. She said that I must always be intolerant of ignorance but understanding of illiteracy. That some people, unable to go to...

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.

In the immortal words of Maya Angelou … people will forget what you said, people will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

It takes the human voice to infuse them with the shades of deeper meaning.

To grow up is to stop putting blame on parents