Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie by Maya Angelou Page A
Authors: Maya Angelou
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Then pain stalks in to plunder.
Tears
Tears
The crystal rags
Viscous tatters
of a worn-through soul
Moans
Deep swan song
Blue farewell
of a dying dream.
The Detached
We die,
Welcoming Bluebeards to our darkening closets,
Stranglers to our outstretched necks.
  Stranglers, who neither care nor
  care to know that
  DEATH IS INTERNAL .
We pray,
Savoring sweet the teethed lies,
Bellying the grounds before alien gods
  Gods, who neither know nor
  wish to know that
  HELL IS INTERNAL .
We love,
Rubbing the nakednesses with gloved hands
Inverting our mouths in tongued kisses,
  Kisses that neither touch nor
  care to touch if
  LOVE IS INTERNAL .
To a Husband
Your voice at times a fist
  Tight in your throat
Jabs ceaselessly at phantoms
  In the room,
Your hand a carved and
  skimming boat
Goes down the Nile
  To point out Pharoahâs tomb.
Youâre Africa to me
  At brightest dawn.
The Congoâs green and
  Copperâs brackish hue,
A continent to build
  With Black Manâs brawn.
I sit at home and see it all
  Through you.
Accident
tonight
  when you spread your pallet
of magic,
  I escaped.
sitting apart,
  I saw you grim and unkempt.
Your vulgar-ness
  not of living
your demands
  not from need.
tonight
  as you sprinkled your brain-dust
of rainbows,
  I had no eyes.
Seeing all
I saw the colors fade
and change.
  The blood, red dulled
through the dyes,
and the naked
Black-White truth.
Letâs Majeste
I sit a throne upon the times
when Kings are rare and
Consorts
slide into the grease of scullery maids.
So gaily wave a crown of light
(astride the royal chair) that blinds
the commoners who genuflect and cross their fingers.
The years will lie beside me
on the queenly bed.
And coupled weâll await
the agesâ dust to cake my lids again.
And when the rousing kiss is given,
why must it always be a fairy, and
only just a Prince?
After
No sound falls
from the moaning sky
No scowl wrinkles
the evening pool
  The stars lean down
  A stony brilliance
  While birds fly
The market leers
its empty shelves
Streets bare bosoms
to scanty cars
  This bed yawns
  beneath the weight
  of our absent selves.
The Mothering Blackness
She came home running
  back to the mothering blackness
  deep in the smothering blackness
white tears icicle gold plains of her face
  She came home running
She came down creeping
  here to the black arms waiting
  now to the warm heart waiting
rime of alien dreams befrost her rich brown face
  She came down creeping
She came home blameless
  black yet as Hagarâs daughter
  tall as was Shebaâs daughter
threats of northern winds die on the desertâs face
  She came home blameless
On Diverse Deviations
When love is a shimmering curtain
Before a door of chance
That leads to a world in question
Wherein the macabrous dance
Of bones that rattle in silence
Of blinded eyes and rolls
Of thick lips thin, denying
A thousand powdered moles,
Where touch to touch is feel
And life a weary whore
  I would be carried off, not gently
  To a shore,
  Where love is the scream of anguish
  And no curtain drapes the door.
Mourning Grace
If today, I follow death
go down its trackless wastes,
salt my tongue on hardened tears
for my precious dear times waste
race
along that promised cave in a headlong
deadlong
haste,
Will you
have
the
grace
to mourn for
me?
How I Can Lie to You
now thread my voice
with lies
of lightness
force within
my mirror eyes
the cold disguise
of sad and wise
decisions.
Sounds Like Pearls
Sounds
  Like pearls
Roll off your tongue
  To grace this eager ebon
Then pain stalks in to plunder.
Tears
Tears
The crystal rags
Viscous tatters
of a worn-through soul
Moans
Deep swan song
Blue farewell
of a dying dream.
The Detached
We die,
Welcoming Bluebeards to our darkening closets,
Stranglers to our outstretched necks.
  Stranglers, who neither care nor
  care to know that
  DEATH IS INTERNAL .
We pray,
Savoring sweet the teethed lies,
Bellying the grounds before alien gods
  Gods, who neither know nor
  wish to know that
  HELL IS INTERNAL .
We love,
Rubbing the nakednesses with gloved hands
Inverting our mouths in tongued kisses,
  Kisses that neither touch nor
  care to touch if
  LOVE IS INTERNAL .
To a Husband
Your voice at times a fist
  Tight in your throat
Jabs ceaselessly at phantoms
  In the room,
Your hand a carved and
  skimming boat
Goes down the Nile
  To point out Pharoahâs tomb.
Youâre Africa to me
  At brightest dawn.
The Congoâs green and
  Copperâs brackish hue,
A continent to build
  With Black Manâs brawn.
I sit at home and see it all
  Through you.
Accident
tonight
  when you spread your pallet
of magic,
  I escaped.
sitting apart,
  I saw you grim and unkempt.
Your vulgar-ness
  not of living
your demands
  not from need.
tonight
  as you sprinkled your brain-dust
of rainbows,
  I had no eyes.
Seeing all
I saw the colors fade
and change.
  The blood, red dulled
through the dyes,
and the naked
Black-White truth.
Letâs Majeste
I sit a throne upon the times
when Kings are rare and
Consorts
slide into the grease of scullery maids.
So gaily wave a crown of light
(astride the royal chair) that blinds
the commoners who genuflect and cross their fingers.
The years will lie beside me
on the queenly bed.
And coupled weâll await
the agesâ dust to cake my lids again.
And when the rousing kiss is given,
why must it always be a fairy, and
only just a Prince?
After
No sound falls
from the moaning sky
No scowl wrinkles
the evening pool
  The stars lean down
  A stony brilliance
  While birds fly
The market leers
its empty shelves
Streets bare bosoms
to scanty cars
  This bed yawns
  beneath the weight
  of our absent selves.
The Mothering Blackness
She came home running
  back to the mothering blackness
  deep in the smothering blackness
white tears icicle gold plains of her face
  She came home running
She came down creeping
  here to the black arms waiting
  now to the warm heart waiting
rime of alien dreams befrost her rich brown face
  She came down creeping
She came home blameless
  black yet as Hagarâs daughter
  tall as was Shebaâs daughter
threats of northern winds die on the desertâs face
  She came home blameless
On Diverse Deviations
When love is a shimmering curtain
Before a door of chance
That leads to a world in question
Wherein the macabrous dance
Of bones that rattle in silence
Of blinded eyes and rolls
Of thick lips thin, denying
A thousand powdered moles,
Where touch to touch is feel
And life a weary whore
  I would be carried off, not gently
  To a shore,
  Where love is the scream of anguish
  And no curtain drapes the door.
Mourning Grace
If today, I follow death
go down its trackless wastes,
salt my tongue on hardened tears
for my precious dear times waste
race
along that promised cave in a headlong
deadlong
haste,
Will you
have
the
grace
to mourn for
me?
How I Can Lie to You
now thread my voice
with lies
of lightness
force within
my mirror eyes
the cold disguise
of sad and wise
decisions.
Sounds Like Pearls
Sounds
  Like pearls
Roll off your tongue
  To grace this eager ebon
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