The Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou (21 page)

His lidless eye slid sideways,
and he rose into my deepest
yearning, bringing
gifts of ready rhythms, and
hourly wound around
my chest,
holding me fast in taut
security.
Then, glistening like
diamonds strewn
upon a black girl's belly,
he left me. And nothing
remains. Beneath my left
breast, two perfect identical punctures,
through which I claim
the air I breathe and
the slithering sound of my own skin
moving in the dark.

Tremors of your network
cause kings to disappear.
Your open mouth in anger
makes nations bow in fear.
Your bombs can change the seasons,
obliterate the spring.
What more do you long for?
Why are you suffering?

You control the human lives
in Rome and Timbuktu.
Lonely nomads wandering
owe Telstar to you.
Seas shift at your bidding,
your mushrooms fill the sky.
Why are you unhappy?
Why do your children cry?

They kneel alone in terror
with dread in every glance.
Their nights are threatened daily
by a grim inheritance.
You dwell in whitened castles
with deep and poisoned moats
and cannot hear the curses
which fill your children's throats.

I got a piece of a job on the waterfront.
Three days ain't hardly a grind.
It buys some beans and collard greens
and pays the rent on time.
'Course the wife works too.

Got three big children to keep in school,
need clothes and shoes on their feet,
give them enough of the things they want
and keep them out of the street.
They've always been good.

My story ain't news and it ain't all sad.
There's plenty worse off than me.
Yet the only thing I really don't need
is strangers’ sympathy.
That's someone else's word for
caring.

It occurs to me now,
I never see you smiling
anymore. Friends
praise your
humor rich, your phrases
turning on a thin
dime. For me your wit is honed
to killing sharpness.
But I never catch
you simply smiling, anymore.

As far as possible, she strove
for them all. Arching her small
frame and grunting
prettily, her
fingers counting the roses
in the wallpaper.

Childhood whoring fitted her
for deceit. Daddy had been a
fondler. Soft lipped mouthings,
soft lapped rubbings.
A smile for pretty shoes,
a kiss could earn a dress.
And a private telephone
was worth the biggest old caress.

The neighbors and family friends
whispered she was seen
walking up and down the streets
when she was seventeen.
No one asked her reasons.
She couldn't even say.
She just took for granted
she was born that way.

As far as possible, she strove
for them all. Arching her small
frame and grunting
prettily, her
fingers counting the roses
in the wallpaper.

Televised news turns
a half-used day into
a waste of desolation.
If nothing wondrous preceded
the catastrophic announcements,
certainly nothing will follow, save
the sad-eyed faces of
bony children,
distended bellies making
mock at their starvation.
Why are they always
Black?
Whom do they await?
The lamb-chop flesh
reeks and cannot be
eaten. Even the
green peas roll on my plate
unmolested. Their innocence
matched by the helpless
hope in the children's faces.
Why do Black children
hope? Who will bring
them peas and lamb chops
and one more morning?

But of course you were
always nothing. No thing.
A red-hot rocket, patriotically
bursting in my
veins. Showers of stars—cascading stars
behind closed eyelids. A
searing brand across my
forehead. Nothing of importance.
A four-letter word stenciled
on the flesh of my inner
thigh.
Stomping through my brain's
mush valleys. Strewing a
halt of new loyalties.

My life, so I say
nothing much.

Glory falls around us
as we sob
a dirge of
desolation on the Cross
and hatred is the ballast of
the rock
which lies upon our necks
and underfoot.
We have woven
robes of silk
and clothed our nakedness
with tapestry.
From crawling on this
murky planet's floor
we soar beyond the
birds and
through the clouds
and edge our way from hate
and blind despair and
bring honor
to our brothers, and to our sisters cheer.
We grow despite the
horror that we feed
upon our own
tomorrow.
We grow.

If I remember correctly,
London is a very queer place.
Mighty queer.
A million miles from
jungle, and the British
lion roars in the stone of
Trafalgar Square.
Mighty queer.
At least a condition
removed from Calcutta,
but old men in Islington and in
too-large sweaters dream
of the sunrise days
of the British Raj.
Awfully queer.
Centuries of hate divide St. George's
channel and the Gaels,
but plum-cheeked English boys drink
sweet tea and grow to fight
for their Queen.
Mighty queer.