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Elegy for Maya Angelou (1928-2014)

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

Elegy for Maya Angelou (1928-2014)

Elegy for Maya Angelou (1928-2014) Elegy for Maya Angelou (1928-2014) Maya Angelou, the poet who puzzlingly punctuated Bill C...

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