Elegy for Maya Angelou (1928-2014)
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| Elegy for Maya Angelou (1928-2014) |
Maya Angelou, the poet who puzzlingly punctuated Bill Clinton's first auguration with references to dried dinosaur and mastodon shit
Maya, about now would be time for me to learn
to write an elegy, a form I've never tackled.
You have joined the ancestors.
In death, even, you urge a woman to learn.
About now I should write a lofty verse,
place you with Amiri in Heaven,
brown feet deep in Elysian grasses or in the river
near Enkai's secret hut. I should write
of your recitations to the Creator. You now
have eternal audience with Dunbar,
salons with Hurston, Hughes, and Brooks.
You hug Martin and Malcolm again and again,
grasp why we have been burdened.
You're greeting, too, those unfamously departed
you made feel famous in their time.
(. . . the girl behind me in college --
you brushed me aside to tell her of her beauty.
Her dark skin, polished copper.
Her nose like yours.
Her thick lips, the invitation to life.
She glowed and glowed. She needed to hear.
I did not know then who I was or perhaps you saw I did,
and I struggled with this invisibility for a long time.)
Maya, you leap again, dancing
the dance none may rehearse.
But you do not need a poem from me.
My thin voice need not elevate
your memory: the world breathes your legacy.
Everywhere an article,
everywhere a tweet,
everywhere your face, your height,
your wisdom words
make books of mourning.
Maya, about now would be time for me to learn
to write an elegy, a form I've never tackled.
You have joined the ancestors.
In death, even, you urge a woman to learn.
About now I should write a lofty verse,
place you with Amiri in Heaven,
brown feet deep in Elysian grasses or in the river
near Enkai's secret hut. I should write
of your recitations to the Creator. You now
have eternal audience with Dunbar,
salons with Hurston, Hughes, and Brooks.
You hug Martin and Malcolm again and again,
grasp why we have been burdened.
You're greeting, too, those unfamously departed
you made feel famous in their time.
(. . . the girl behind me in college --
you brushed me aside to tell her of her beauty.
Her dark skin, polished copper.
Her nose like yours.
Her thick lips, the invitation to life.
She glowed and glowed. She needed to hear.
I did not know then who I was or perhaps you saw I did,
and I struggled with this invisibility for a long time.)
Maya, you leap again, dancing
the dance none may rehearse.
But you do not need a poem from me.
My thin voice need not elevate
your memory: the world breathes your legacy.
Everywhere an article,
everywhere a tweet,
everywhere your face, your height,
your wisdom words
make books of mourning.
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