Quotes from Maya Angelou

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.

All knowledge is spendable currency, depending on the market.

Whenever I began to question whether God exists, I looked up to the sky and surely there, right there, between the sun and moon, stands my grandmother, singing a long meter hymn, a song somewhere between a moan and a lullaby and I know faith is the evidence of things unseen. And all I have to do is continue trying to be a Christian.

Independence is a heady draft, and if you drink it in your youth, it can have the same effect on the brain as young wine does. It does not matter that its taste is not always appealing. It is addictive and with each drink you want more.

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

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

I answer the heroic question, 'Death, where is thy sting?' with 'It is in my heart and mind and memories.

Glory falls around us as we sob a dirge of desolation on the Cross

Imagine, I might really become somebody. Someday.

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

I speak to the Black experience, but I am always talking about the human condition--about what we can endure, dream, fail at and survive.

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

My mother's gifts of courage to me were both large and small. The latter are woven so subtly into the fabric of my psyche that I can hardly distinguish where she stops and I begin.

Faith is the evidence of the unseen.

One person, with good purpose, can, constitute the majority.

Don't kneel please. Sometimes people put people on pedestals so they can see them more clearly and knock them off more easily

I've learned that you can tell a lot about a person by the way (s)he handles these three things: a rainy day, lost luggage, and tangled Christmas tree lights.

This bed yawns beneath the weight of our absent selves.

You said to lean on your arm And I am leaning You said to trust in your love And I am trusting You said to call on your name And I am calling I'm stepping out on your word

A bird doesn't sing because it has an answer, it sings because it has a song.

My mother raised me, and then freed me

A wise woman wishes to be no one's enemy; a wise woman refuses to be anyone's victim.

If more Africans had eaten missionaries, the continent would be in better shape.

Preach it, I say preach it.