“When I started my musical career, I was a maid,” she told the audience. “I used to clean houses. My parents, my mother was a proud janitor. My stepfather, who raised me like his very own, worked at the post office and my father was a trash man — they all wore uniforms. And that’s why I stand here today in my black and white and I wear my uniform to honor them.”
“I have written a poem for a woman who rides a bus in New York City. She’s a maid, she has two shopping bags. When the bus stops abruptly, she laughs. If the bus stops slowly, she laughs. I thought, ‘Mmm, a-ha.’ Now, if you don’t know black features, you may think she’s laughing. But she wasn’t laughing. She was simply extending her lips and making a sound. I said, ‘Oh, I see.’ That’s that survival apparatus. Now, let me write about that to honor this woman who helps us to survive.”
Maya Angelou: And Still I Rise (2016) dir. Rita Coburn & Bob Hercules
