The English, Foreign Languages and English as a Second Language Department is pleased to present the Campus Poetry Project to celebrate poets and poetry during National Poetry Month that was established by the Academy of American Poets in 1996 and is celebrated every April.
“Caged Bird”
by Maya Angelou
Please click here to read “Caged Bird” by Maya Angelou.
From The Poetry Foundation: An acclaimed American poet, storyteller, activist and autobiographer, Maya Angelou was born Marguerite Johnson in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1928. Angelou had a career as a singer, dancer, actress, composer. She was Hollywood’s first female black director, but became most famous as a writer, editor, essayist, playwright and poet.
As a civil rights activist, Angelou worked for Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. She was also an educator and served as the Reynolds professor of American Studies at Wake Forest University. By 1975, wrote Carol E. Neubauer in “Southern Women Writers: The New Generation,” Angelou was recognized “as a spokesperson for… all people who are committed to raising the moral standards of living in the United States.” She served on two presidential committees, for Gerald Ford in 1975 and for Jimmy Carter in 1977. In 2000, Angelou was awarded the National Medal of Arts by President Bill Clinton, and in 2010, she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor in the U.S., by President Barack Obama. The was the keynote speaker during Hudson Valley Community College’s 50th anniversary celebration in Fall 2003. Angelou was awarded over 50 honorary degrees before her death in 2014.
Angelou joined the Harlem Writers Guild in the late 1950s, and met James Baldwin and other important writers. It was during this time that Angelou had the opportunity to hear Dr. Martin Luther King speak. Inspired by his message, she decided to become a part of the struggle for civil rights.
“I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings” is the first of Angelou’s six autobiographies. It is widely taught in schools, though it has faced controversy over its portrayal of race, sexual abuse and violence. Angelou’s use of fiction-writing techniques like dialogue and plot in her autobiographies was innovative for its time and helped, in part, to complicate the genre’s relationship with truth and memory.
Angelou’s poetry often benefited from her performance of it and, during her lifetime, Angelou recited her poems before spellbound crowds. Her poetry can also be traced to African-American oral traditions like slave and work songs, especially in her use of personal narrative and emphasis on individual responses to hardship, oppression and loss. In addition to examining individual experience, Angelou’s poems often respond to matters like race and sex on a larger social and psychological scale. (Photo courtesy of the North Carolina Literary Hall of Fame.)
The Campus Poetry Project
Throughout April, be on the lookout for poetry postings in the Campus Chronicle, on digital monitors and on lawn signs across our main campus.
“This Is The World I Want To Live In. The Shared World.”
~ Naomi Shihab Nye
National Poetry Month – April 2025
