A Change Maker Worth Remembering

One of the vital lessons we must learn, as Change Makers, is to give a reverent and attentive ear to the sage voices who have walked before us. Respectfully acknowledging that they have paved the very roads we now walk down. Acceding to the fact that we are often just continuing a race they have had the courage to begin.

 

Maya Angelou is one of those voices, a voice of change, a voice of courage and most importantly, a voice of perseverance. The voice of her life tells us that in the midst of our fix it now microwave society true change happens slowly, against the greatest odds, and with an extra helping of pain and suffering. It’s often only deep in the valley that the mountaintop comes into view and we are able to rise up to be what we’ve been longing for.

 

Maya Angelou was a change maker. If you’ve never had the opportunity to listen to her voice of courage, perseverance and change then here is a sample. Listen and rise.

 

Still I Rise

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.

 

………

 

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.