Still I Rise You may kill me with your

By Maya Angelou hatefulness,

You may write me down in history But still, like air, I'll rise.
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt Does my sexiness upset you?
But still, like dust, I'll rise. Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
Does my sassiness upset you? At the meeting of my thighs?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells Out of the huts of history's shame
Pumping in my living room. I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in
Just like moons and like suns, pain
With the certainty of tides, I rise
Just like hopes springing high, I'm a black ocean, leaping and
Still I'll rise. wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the
Did you want to see me broken? tide.
Bowed head and lowered eyes? Leaving behind nights of terror and
Shoulders falling down like fear
teardrops. I rise
Weakened by my soulful cries. Into a daybreak that's wondrously
clear
Does my haughtiness offend you? I rise
Don't you take it awful hard Bringing the gifts that my
'Cause I laugh like I've got gold ancestors gave,
mines I am the dream and the hope of
Diggin' in my own back yard. the slave.
I rise
You may shoot me with your I rise
words, I rise.
You may cut me with your eyes,
The Road Not Taken
By Robert Frost
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay

In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I--
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Siren Song
By Margaret Atwood

This is the one song everyone

would like to learn: the song
that is irresistible:

the song that forces men

to leap overboard in squadrons
even though they see the beached skulls

the song nobody knows

because anyone who has heard it
is dead, and the others can't remember.

Shall I tell you the secret

and if I do, will you get me
out of this bird suit?

I don'y enjoy it here

squatting on this island
looking picturesque and mythical

with these two faethery maniacs,

I don't enjoy singing
this trio, fatal and valuable.

I will tell the secret to you,

to you, only to you.
Come closer. This song

is a cry for help: Help me!

Only you, only you can,
you are unique

at last. Alas
it is a boring song
but it works every time.
The Times They Are A-Changin'
By Bob Dylan

Come gather round people

Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
Youll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you is worth savin
Then you better start swimmin or youll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin

Come writers and critics

Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance wont come again
And dont speak too soon
For the wheels still in spin
And theres no tellin who that its namin
For the loser now will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin

Come senators, congressmen

Please heed the call
Dont stand in the doorway
Dont block up the hall
For he that gets hurt
Will be he who has stalled
Theres a battle outside and it is ragin
Itll soon shake your windows and rattle your walls
For the times they are a-changin

Come mothers and fathers

Throughout the land
And dont criticize
What you cant understand
Your sons and your daughters
Are beyond your command
Your old road is rapidly agin
Please get out of the new one if you cant lend your hand
For the times they are a-changin
SONNET 55
By William Shakespeare

Not marble, nor the gilded monuments

Of princes, shall outlive this powerful rhyme;
But you shall shine more bright in these contents
Than unswept stone besmear'd with sluttish time.
When wasteful war shall statues overturn,
And broils root out the work of masonry,
Nor Mars his sword nor war's quick fire shall burn
The living record of your memory.
'Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.
So, till the judgment that yourself arise,
You live in this, and dwell in lover's eyes.
AN AFRICAN ELEGY
BY BEN OKRI

We are the miracles that God made

To taste the bitter fruit of Time.
We are precious.
And one day our suffering
Will turn into the wonders of the earth.

There are things that burn me now

Which turn golden when I am happy.
Do you see the mystery of our pain?
That we bear poverty
And are able to sing and dream sweet things

And that we never curse the air when it is warm

Or the fruit when it tastes so good
Or the lights that bounce gently on the waters?
We bless things even in our pain.
We bless them in silence.

That is why our music is so sweet.

It makes the air remember.
There are secret miracles at work
That only Time will bring forth.
I too have heard the dead singing.

And they tell me that

This life is good
They tell me to live it gently
With fire, and always with hope.
There is wonder here

And there is surprise

In everything the unseen moves.
The ocean is full of songs.
The sky is not an enemy.
Destiny is our friend.
Alone
By Edgar Allan Poe

From childhood's hour I have not been

As others were; I have not seen
As others saw; I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I loved, I loved alone.
Then- in my childhood, in the dawn
Of a most stormy life- was drawn
From every depth of good and ill
The mystery which binds me still:
From the torrent, or the fountain,
From the red cliff of the mountain,
From the sun that round me rolled
In its autumn tint of gold,
From the lightning in the sky
As it passed me flying by,
From the thunder and the storm,
And the cloud that took the form
(When the rest of Heaven was blue)
Of a demon in my view.