Maya Angelou & the Power of Words

We’ve all heard the old saying that a picture speaks a thousand words. However, words can paint pictures that ignite something in people’s hearts. Words can make us feel less alone, feel understood, feel valued and feel loved. The power of words is nearly unmatched with how deeply they can impact someone. Maya Angelou is a perfect example of someone who has used words to serve as something more than just words. Her words become the very thing that she writes about. In her poem Caged Bird, Angelou writes about a bird that has never experienced the very freedom that it longs for. There are people who can relate to these feelings of being trapped, of wanting to know what more is out there. For them, this poem could be a metaphor for everything they’ve been trying to articulate but just couldn’t find the right words. Phenomenal Woman is a poem in which Angelou celebrates herself and her beauty as a Black woman. Black women everywhere have been told they don’t fit the beauty standards, or that they need to aspire to whiteness. Phenomenal Woman shuts that down with its opening lines:

“Pretty women wonder

where my secret lies.

I’m not cute or built to suit a fashion model’s size

But when I start to tell them,

They think I’m telling lies.”

Both of these poems are fairly well-known, and for good reason. Maya Angelou’s writing shows us that words are more powerful than we think. Words can completely shift your perspective. Most importantly, words are a form of resistance. Maya Anglou proved this in her poem Still I Rise:

“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.”