Maya Angelou citations

Page 8

“Nous nous délectons de la beauté du papillon, mais nous admettons rarement les changements qu’il a subi pour atteindre cette beauté.”

“La clef du succès, c'est de s’aimer soi-même, d’aimer ce que l'on fait et d’aimer la façon dont on le fait.”

“Il faut avoir assez de courage pour faire confiance à l'amour une fois de plus et toujours une fois de plus.”

“I had read a Tale of Two Cities and found it up to my standards as a romantic novel. She opened the first page and I heard poetry for the first time in my life… her voice slid in and curved down trough and over the words. She was nearly singing.”

“I don't believe an accident of birth makes people sisters or brothers. It makes them siblings, gives them mutuality of parentage. Sisterhood and brotherhood is a condition people have to work at.”

“If you don't like something, change it. If you can't change it, change your attitude.”

“Courage is the most important of all the virtues, because without courage you can't practice any other virtue consistently. You can practice any virtue erratically, but nothing consistently without courage.”

“No human being can be more human than another human being. I liberate you from my ignorance.”

“I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.”

“Remember, people will judge you by your actions not your intentions. You may have a heart of gold but so does a hard-boiled egg.”

“You are the sum total of everything you’ve ever seen, heard, eaten, smelled, been told, forgot - it’s all there. Everything influences each of us, and because of that I try to make sure that my experiences are positive.”

“I couldn't tell fact from fiction,
Or if the dream was true
My only sure prediction
In this world was you.
I'd touch your features inchly. Beard love and dared the cost, The sented spiel reeled me unreal And I found my senses lost.”

“The dread of futility has been my life-long plague.”

“I make writing as much a part of my life as I do eating or listening to music.”

“We are missing Michael.
But we do know we had him, and we are the world.”

“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.”

“Mother's life flowed radiant. Flourescent-tipped waves on incoming tides.”

“He thrived with passion and compassion, humor and style. We had him whether we know who he was or did not know, he was ours and we were his.”

“I did then what I knew best, when I knew better, I did better. Maya Angelo”

“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.”

“Faith is the evidence of the unseen.”

“Love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.
A Brave and Startling Truth.”

“Each time I write a book, every time I face that yellow pad, the challenge is so great. I have written eleven books, but each time I think, ‘Uh oh, they’re going to find out now. I’ve run a game on everybody and they’re going to find me out.”

“We grow despite the
horror that we feed
upon our own
tomorrow.
We grow.”

“Years ago I read a man named Machado de Assis who wrote a book called Dom Casmurro. Machado de Assis is a South American writer — black father, Portuguese mother — writing in 1865, say. I thought the book was very nice. Then I went back and read the book and said, Hmm. I didn’t realize all that was in that book. Then I read it again, and again, and I came to the conclusion that what Machado de Assis had done for me was almost a trick: he had beckoned me onto the beach to watch a sunset. And I had watched the sunset with pleasure. When I turned around to come back in I found that the tide had come in over my head. That’s when I decided to write.”

“Petulant priests, greedy
centurions, and one million
incensed gestures stand
between your love and me.”

“I am capable of what every other human is capable of. This is one of the great lessons of war and life.”

“The needs of a society determine its ethics.”

“It is possible and imperative that we discover
A brave and startling truth.”

“My dear, when people show you who they are, why don't you believe them? Why must you be shown 29 times before you can see who they really are? Why can't you get it the first time?”

“If we are bold, love strikes away the chains of fear from our souls.”

“You were a precious pearl
How I loved to see you shine,
You were the perfect girl.
And you were mine.
For a time.
For a time.
Just for a time.”