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 back yard.
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.
Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
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
Analyzing the poem:
The poem "Still I Rise" by Maya Angelou, an African American woman living in the early 1960's, describes the internal thoughts of this woman and how they represent the rest of the African American race during that time.
In the first stanza, she begins to talk about how black people will probably be remembered as something they never were, since the ones that will be talking about them are the white's. I believe she is strongly referring to women mostly when she writes about her "sassiness", her "haughtiness", and her "sexiness". She continuously asks whoever she is speaking to if they are offended or upset by all her good qualities and she does this in order to show that white people were not willing to admit that African Americans could also be talented and educated and...human. She seems to be confronting them in the fourth stanza because she knows that they really want to see her, and the black race in general, humiliated and underestimated.
Using similes and repetition as her main literary devices, Angelou emphasizes how much she believes in all the black people who are being treated so badly. The phrase "I Rise" is constantly repeated at the end of each stanza to show that no matter what her race will go through, no matter how horrible times, such as Slavery, they had to face, they will always stand strong against all that deny them their rights to be equal with all the other races.
The poem has a strong sense of feminism being exposed. She compares her womanhood for example to the most precious diamond and she also finds a connection between women and power vs. nature. She presents herself as a very strong and brave African American woman that can always rise through her ashes and is extremely proud of where she comes from.
Lastly I’d like to say that the poem unfolds in a pattern and Angelou’s point really gets through to the reader even after one read-through. In the beginning she starts off in a low tone and as she moves on she chooses to use phrases with deeper meaning, uses more metaphors and similes, and she makes you stop and think about what she is trying to say through her twisted words. Her tone starts speeding up faster and faster as she moves on towards the end and you can sense the tension building up as she seeks to state her point thoroughly. She ends the poem in a positive spirit using words such as “dream” and “hope”, and once more repeats the powerful phrase “I Rise”, which is also the one thing that the cycle returns to. In the cycle, anything is possible to happen, but in order for it to ever be complete, the black race must RISE.
