Fear

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

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• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  Bailey said out loud, “Hot dog” and “Damn” and “She's going to beat his butt.” But Reverend Thomas didn't intend to wait for that eventuality, so as Sister Monroe approached the pulpit from the right he started descending from the left. He was not intimidated by his change of venue. He continued preaching and moving. He finally stopped right in front of the collection table, which put him almost in our laps, and Sister Monroe rounded the altar on his heels, followed by the deacons, ushers, some unofficial members and a few of the bigger children. Just as the elder opened his mouth, pink tongue waving, and said, “Great God of Mount Nebo,” Sister Monroe hit him on the back of his head with her purse. Twice. Before he could bring his lips together, his teeth fell, no, actually his teeth jumped, out of his mouth. The grinning uppers and lowers lay by my right shoe, looking empty and at the same time appearing to contain all the emptiness in the world. I could have stretched out a foot and kicked them under the bench or behind the collection table. Sister Monroe was struggling with his coat, and the men had all but picked her up to remove her from the building. Bailey pinched me and said without moving his lips, “I'd like to see him eat dinner now.” I looked at Reverend Thomas desperately. If he appeared just a little sad or embarrassed, I could feel sorry for him and wouldn't be able to laugh. My sympathy for him would keep me from laughing. I dreaded laughing in church. If I lost control, two things were certain to happen. I would surely pee, and just as surely get a whipping. And this time I would probably die because everything was funny—Sister Monroe, and Momma trying to keep her quiet with those threatening looks, and Bailey whispering “Preach it” and Elder Thomas with his lips flapping loose like tired elastic. But Reverend Thomas shrugged off Sister Monroe's weakening clutch, pulled out an extra-large white handkerchief and spread it over his nasty little teeth. Putting them in his pocket, he gummed, “Naked I came into the world, and naked I shall go out.”

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  “I hungered and you gave me to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me to drink. I was sick and you visited me. In prison, and you left me not. Inasmuch as you have done it unto the least of one of these, you have done it unto Me.” He bounded off the dais and approached the velvet gray box. With an imperious gesture, he snatched the gray cloth off the open flap and gazed downward into the mystery. “Sleep on, thy graceful soul, till Christ calls you to come forth into His bright heaven.” He continued speaking directly to the dead woman, and I half wished she would rise up and answer him, offended by the coarseness of his approach. A scream burst from Mr. Taylor. He stood up suddenly and lengthened his arms toward the minister, the coffin and his wife's corpse. For a long minute he hovered, his back to the church as the instructive words kept falling around the room, rich with promise, full with warnings. Momma and other ladies caught him in time to bring him back to the bench, where he quickly folded upon himself like a Br'er Rabbit rag doll. Mr. Taylor and the high church officials were the first to file around the bier to wave farewell to the departed and get a glimpse of what lay in store for all men. Then on heavy feet, made more ponderous by the guilt of the living viewing the dead, the adult church marched up to the coffin and back to their seats. Their faces, which showed apprehension before reaching the coffin, revealed, on the way down the opposite aisle, a final confirmation of their fears. Watching them was a little like peeping through a window when the shade is not drawn flush. Although I didn't try, it was impossible not to record their roles in the drama. And then a black-dressed usher stuck her hand out woodenly toward the children's rows. There was the shifty rustling of unreadiness but finally a boy of fourteen led us off and I dared not hang back, as much as I hated the idea of seeing Mrs. Taylor. Up the aisle, the moans and screams merged with the sickening smell of woolen black clothes worn in summer weather and green leaves wilting over yellow flowers. I couldn't distinguish whether I was smelling the clutching sound of misery or hearing the cloying odor of death. It would have been easier to see her through the gauze, but instead I looked down on the stark face that seemed suddenly so empty and evil. It knew secrets that I never wanted to share. The cheeks had fallen back to the ears and a solicitous mortician had put lipstick on the black mouth. The scent of decay was sweet and clasping. It groped for life with a hunger both greedy and hateful. But it was hypnotic.

• From The Pisces (2018)

  “So cryptic,” I said. “Are you aware of death?” Asking that, I felt kind of creepy in a good way. He had a lot of power in not revealing too much of himself. Just that lack of willingness to disclose—that’s all it took for me to perceive rejection. So this gave me a little edge. Also, his observation about me and death could have been a bit scary if he wasn’t so matter-of-fact. I mean, he was a stranger, male, and likely stronger than me. He could easily pull me off a rock into the water and drown me. But I trusted him completely—at least in terms of my physical safety. And now that he had complimented me about my proximity to death and I had owned it, and thrown it right back at him, I felt cool. We had both decided now that death was my territory. I was the Professor of Death. Much more than a middle-aged woman who was beginning to get serious crushy feelings for a young stranger in the water. “I know about death,” he said. “Have you ever seen someone die?” I asked. “Like up close and one-on-one?” “Yes,” he said. “I have watched a number of people die.” “Scary, right? The dying process. I don’t feel scared about death but dying freaks me the fuck out.” “I’m not scared of dying,” he said. “You’re not?” Now he was the professor and I was the pussy. “I would say I’m less scared of dying than I am of life.” Actually, I maybe agreed with him. “I think I’m equally scared of both,” I said. This was the truth. It felt good to say it. “What is it about dying that scares you the most? Are you afraid of having regrets?” “No,” I said. “I think it’s literally the physical process. Like, the suffocation. I’m so scared to be suffocating and panicking. I get panicked even when I go to the dentist. I am not good with discomfort. So I think I’m more scared of the discomfort—my own fear around it—than anything else.” “It might be scary for a moment,” he said. “Maybe for a few minutes. But then, from what I’ve seen, you are very free.” “Maybe,” I said. “But it’s the fear before the freedom that I’m scared of. If I could just go to sleep—just like that, go to sleep and never wake up—I would do that anytime. I would do it tonight. But I’m scared to be conscious while it’s happening.” “I had that feeling about you. That you would be happy to just go to sleep.” “Why? Because I’m so boring?” “Not at all,” he said. “The opposite. But I can feel you’ve suffered.” He was so dramatic. “Yeah, well, life is the dumbest,” I said, standing up. “I’ve suffered too,” he said. “I’ve been sick.” This piqued my interest. “Yeah?”

• From The Letter to the Hebrews (The New Daily Study Bible) (2002)

  There are certain things in which we cannot change our minds but must live our lives by the choice that we have made. THE TERROR OF THE OLD AND THE GLORY OF THE NEW Hebrews 12:18–24 It is not to something that can be touched that you have come, to a flaming fire, to mist and gloom and storm blast, and to the blare of a trumpet, and to a voice which spoke such words that those who heard it begged that not another word should be further spoken unto them, for they could not bear the command: ‘If even a beast touches the mountain, it shall be stoned.’ So terrifying was the apparition that Moses said: ‘I am in utter fear and trembling.’ But you have come to Mount Sion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, to ten thousands of angels gathered in glad assembly, to the assembly of the honoured ones whose names are in the registers of heaven, to that God who is judge of all, to the spirits of just men who have come to that goal for which they were created, and to Jesus, the mediator of the new covenant, to the sprinkled blood which has a message greater than the blood of Abel. T HIS passage is a contrast between the old and the new. It is a contrast between the giving of the law on Mount Sinai and the new covenant of which Jesus is the mediator. Down to verse 21, it has echo after echo of the story of the giving of the law on Mount Sinai. Deuteronomy 4:11 describes that first law-giving: ‘you approached and stood at the foot of the mountain while the mountain was blazing up to the very heavens, shrouded in dark clouds. Then the Lord spoke to you out of the fire.’ Exodus 19:12–13 tells of the unapproachability of that awful mountain: ‘You shall set limits for the people all around, saying, “Be careful not to go up to the mountain or to touch the edge of it. Any who touch the mountain shall be put to death. No hand shall touch them, but they shall be stoned or shot with arrows; whether animal or human being, they shall not live.”

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  Get some cool towels and wipe your sister's face.” As Bailey left the room, Mr. Freeman advanced to the bed. He leaned over, his whole face a threat that could have smothered me. “If you tell …” And again so softly, I almost didn't hear it—“If you tell.” I couldn't summon up the energy to answer him. He had to know that I wasn't going to tell anything. Bailey came in with the towels and Mr. Freeman walked out. Later Mother made a broth and sat on the edge of the bed to feed me. The liquid went down my throat like bones. My belly and behind were as heavy as cold iron, but it seemed my head had gone away and pure air had replaced it on my shoulders. Bailey read to me from The Rover Boys until he got sleepy and went to bed. That night I kept waking to hear Mother and Mr. Freeman arguing. I couldn't hear what they were saying, but I did hope that she wouldn't make him so mad that he'd hurt her too. I knew he could do it, with his cold face and empty eyes. Their voices came in faster and faster, the high sounds on the heels of the lows. I would have liked to have gone in. Just passed through as if I were going to the toilet. Just show my face and they might stop, but my legs refused to move. I could move the toes and ankles, but the knees had turned to wood. Maybe I slept, but soon morning was there and Mother was pretty over my bed. “How're you feeling, baby?” “Fine, Mother.” An instinctive answer. “Where's Bailey?” She said he was still asleep but that she hadn't slept all night. She had been in my room off and on to see about me. I asked her where Mr. Freeman was, and her face chilled with remembered anger. “He's gone. Moved this morning. I'm going to take your temperature after I put on your Cream of Wheat.” Could I tell her now? The terrible pain assured me that I couldn't. What he did to me, and what I allowed, must have been very bad if already God let me hurt so much. If Mr. Freeman was gone, did that mean Bailey was out of danger? And if so, if I told him, would he still love me? After Mother took my temperature, she said she was going to bed for a while but to wake her if I felt sicker. She told Bailey to watch my face and arms for spots and when they came up he could paint them with calamine lotion. That Sunday goes and comes in my memory like a bad connection on an overseas telephone call.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  I supposed that she was counting on bringing that emotional lady up short with a severe look or two. But Sister Monroe's voice had already reached the danger point. “Preach it!” There were a few smothered giggles from the children's section, and Bailey nudged me again. “I say, preach it”—in a whisper. Sister Monroe echoed him loudly, “I say, preach it!” Two deacons wedged themselves around Brother Jackson as a preventive measure and two large determined-looking men walked down the aisle toward Sister Monroe. While the sounds in the church were increasing, Elder Thomas made the regrettable mistake of increasing his volume too. Then suddenly, like a summer rain, Sister Monroe broke through the cloud of people trying to hem her in, and flooded up to the pulpit. She didn't stop this time but continued immediately to the altar, bound for Elder Thomas, crying “I say, preach it.” Bailey said out loud, “Hot dog” and “Damn” and “She's going to beat his butt.” But Reverend Thomas didn't intend to wait for that eventuality, so as Sister Monroe approached the pulpit from the right he started descending from the left. He was not intimidated by his change of venue. He continued preaching and moving. He finally stopped right in front of the collection table, which put him almost in our laps, and Sister Monroe rounded the altar on his heels, followed by the deacons, ushers, some unofficial members and a few of the bigger children. Just as the elder opened his mouth, pink tongue waving, and said, “Great God of Mount Nebo,” Sister Monroe hit him on the back of his head with her purse. Twice. Before he could bring his lips together, his teeth fell, no, actually his teeth jumped, out of his mouth. The grinning uppers and lowers lay by my right shoe, looking empty and at the same time appearing to contain all the emptiness in the world. I could have stretched out a foot and kicked them under the bench or behind the collection table. Sister Monroe was struggling with his coat, and the men had all but picked her up to remove her from the building. Bailey pinched me and said without moving his lips, “I'd like to see him eat dinner now.” I looked at Reverend Thomas desperately. If he appeared just a little sad or embarrassed, I could feel sorry for him and wouldn't be able to laugh. My sympathy for him would keep me from laughing. I dreaded laughing in church. If I lost control, two things were certain to happen. I would surely pee, and just as surely get a whipping. And this time I would probably die because everything was funny—Sister Monroe, and Momma trying to keep her quiet with those threatening looks, and Bailey whispering “Preach it” and Elder Thomas with his lips flapping loose like tired elastic.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  father found that promise the funniest thing he had heard since we left home. (He had laughed uproariously when Dolores didn't answer my goodbye and I explained as we drove away that she hadn't heard.) The guard was not discouraged by my attempts to get away from his probing hands and I would have squirmed to the driver's seat had not Dad opened the door and got in. After many adiós's and bonitas and espositas Dad started the car, and we were on our grimy way again. Signs informed me that we were headed for Ensenada. In those miles, along the twisted roads beside the steep mountain, I feared that I would never get back to America, civilization, English and wide streets again. He sipped from the bottle and sang snatches of Mexican songs as we climbed the tortuous mountain road. Our destination turned out not to be the town of Ensenada, after all, but about five miles out of the city limits. We pulled up in the dirt yard of a cantina where half-clothed children chased mean-looking chickens around and around. The noise of the car brought women to the door of the ramshackle building but didn't distract the single-minded activity of either the grubby kids or the scrawny fowls. A woman's voice sang out, “Baylee, Baylee.” And suddenly a claque of women crowded to the door and overflowed into the yard. Dad told me to get out of the car and we went to meet the women. He explained quickly that I was his daughter, which everyone thought to be uncontrollably funny. We were herded into a long room with a bar at one end. Tables sat lopsidedly on a loose-plank floor. The ceiling caught and held my attention. Paper streamers in every possible color waved in the near-still air, and as I watched a few fell to the floor. No one seemed to notice, or if they did, it was obviously unimportant that their sky was falling in. There were a few men on stools at the bar, and they greeted my father with the ease of familiarity. I was taken around and each person was told my name and age. The formal high school “Cómo está usted?” was received as the most charming utterance possible. People clapped me on the back, shook Dad's hand and spoke a rat-a-tat Spanish that I was unable to follow. Baylee was the hero of the hour, and as he warmed under the uninhibited show of affection I saw a new side of the man. His quizzical smile disappeared and he stopped his affected way of talking (it would have been difficult to wedge ers into that rapid Spanish). It seemed hard to believe that he was a lonely person, searching relentlessly in bottles, under women's skirts, in church work and lofty job titles for his “personal niche,” lost before birth and unrecovered since.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  I begged in vain. I was sure to roll over and crush out his life or break those fragile bones. She wouldn't hear of it, and within minutes the pretty golden baby was lying on his back in the center of my bed, laughing at me. I lay on the edge of the bed, stiff with fear, and vowed not to sleep all night long. But the eat-sleep routine I had begun in the hospital, and kept up under Mother's dictatorial command, got the better of me. I dropped off. My shoulder was shaken gently. Mother whispered, “Maya, wake up. But don't move.” I knew immediately that the awakening had to do with the baby. I tensed. “I'm awake.” She turned the light on and said, “Look at the baby.” My fears were so powerful I couldn't move to look at the center of the bed. She said again, “Look at the baby.” I didn't hear sadness in her voice, and that helped me to break the bonds of terror. The baby was no longer in the center of the bed. At first I thought he had moved. But after closer investigation I found that I was lying on my stomach with my arm bent at a right angle. Under the tent of blanket, which was poled by my elbow and forearm, the baby slept touching my side. Mother whispered, “See, you don't have to think about doing the right thing. If you're for the right thing, then you do it without thinking.” She turned out the light and I patted my son's body lightly and went back to sleep. This book is dedicated to MY SON, GUY JOHNSON, AND ALL THE STRONG BLACK BIRDS OF PROMISE who defy the odds and gods and sing their songs ACKNOWLEDGMENTSI thank my mother, VIVIAN BAXTER, and my brother, BAILEY JOHNSON, who encouraged me to remember. Thanks to the HARLEM WRITERS' GUILD for concern and to JOHN O. KILLENS who told me I could write. To NANA KOBINA NKETSIA IV who insisted that I must. Lasting gratitude to GERARD PURCELL who believed concretely and to TONY D'AMATO who understood. Thanks to ABBEY LINCOLN ROACH for naming my book. A final thanks to my editor at Random House, ROBERT LOOMIS, who gently prodded me back into the lost years. BY MAYA ANGELOUAUTOBIOGRAPHY I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Gather Together in My Name Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry Like Christmas The Heart of a Woman All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes A Song Flung Up to Heaven Mom & Me & Mom ESSAYS Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now Even the Stars Look Lonesome Letter to My Daughter POETRY Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ’fore I Diiie Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well And Still I Rise Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing? I Shall Not Be Moved On the Pulse of Morning Phenomenal Woman A Brave and Startling Truth Amazing Peace Mother

• From How to Read the Bible and Still Be a Christian (2015)

  But two other prophecies from that same time insist that Yahweh, God of Israel—and not Ashur, God of Assyria—is God of the “whole earth” (10:14; 14:26). Still, although Ashur as World-God facilitated Isaiah’s contrary vision of Yahweh as World-God, matrix was, as always, an ambiguous gift for biblical tradition. With that model came Assyrian terrorism as ethnic identity, foreign policy, and military strategy. Here are three examples, almost at random: I covered the wide plain with the corpses of their fighting men. I dyed the mountains with their blood. (King Shalmanasar III, 859–824 BCE ) I filled the plain with the bodies of their warriors, like grass. Their testicles I cut off, and tore out their privates like the seeds of summer cucumbers. (King Sennacherib, 704–681 BCE ) I tore out the tongues of those whose slanderous mouths had uttered blasphemies against my God Ashur. . . . I fed their corpses, cut into small pieces, to dogs, pigs, vultures, eagles, the birds of the sky and the fish of the ocean. (King Ashurbanipal, 668–627 BCE ) Here, then, is the problem. Yahweh said, “Ah, Assyria, the rod of my anger— / the club in their hands is my fury!” (Isa. 10:5). Unfortunately, if Assyria is the agent of God’s anger, it is also the norm of God’s character. Far too much of the upper Tigris entered the lower Jordan; far too much of Assyrian imperial theology entered Israelite covenantal theology; far too much of the God Ashur entered into the God Yahweh in the biblical tradition. “All the Foundations of the Earth Are Shaken”I CLOSE THIS CHAPTER with a different vision of Yahweh as World-God. We stand once more amid the divine council in heaven but the Supreme God is surrounded this time by the subordinate Gods who rule the earth under a mandate from that High God: “God has taken his place in the divine council; in the midst of the gods he holds judgment” (Ps 82:1). This time, however, the divine complaint is not against Israel, but against those who rule the earth, against the powers that be: How long will you judge unjustly and show partiality to the wicked? Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked. (82:2–4) This indictment begets neither apology nor excuse from the subordinate Gods but simply this response: “They have neither knowledge nor understanding, / they walk around in darkness” (82:5a). The powers that be do not even understand the accusation, do not recognize the problem, do not acknowledge their responsibility. They say, as it were: “We are about power. Who brought up this justice thing?” Then comes this searing result: “all the foundations of the earth are shaken” (82:5b). There is nothing about external curses or punishments as Sanction from God. Instead there is the terrible consequence that injustice shakes the foundations of the earth.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  I knew immediately that the awakening had to do with the baby. I tensed. “I'm awake.” She turned the light on and said, “Look at the baby.” My fears were so powerful I couldn't move to look at the center of the bed. She said again, “Look at the baby.” I didn't hear sadness in her voice, and that helped me to break the bonds of terror. The baby was no longer in the center of the bed. At first I thought he had moved. But after closer investigation I found that I was lying on my stomach with my arm bent at a right angle. Under the tent of blanket, which was poled by my elbow and forearm, the baby slept touching my side. Mother whispered, “See, you don't have to think about doing the right thing. If you're for the right thing, then you do it without thinking.” She turned out the light and I patted my son's body lightly and went back to sleep. This book is dedicated to MY SON, GUY JOHNSON, AND ALL THE STRONG BLACK BIRDS OF PROMISE who defy the odds and gods and sing their songs ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I thank my mother, VIVIAN BAXTER, and my brother, BAILEY JOHNSON, who encouraged me to remember. Thanks to the HARLEM WRITERS' GUILD for concern and to JOHN O. KILLENS who told me I could write. To NANA KOBINA NKETSIA IV who insisted that I must. Lasting gratitude to GERARD PURCELL who believed concretely and to TONY D'AMATO who understood. Thanks to ABBEY LINCOLN ROACH for naming my book. A final thanks to my editor at Random House, ROBERT LOOMIS, who gently prodded me back into the lost years. BY MAYA ANGELOU AUTOBIOGRAPHY I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings Gather Together in My Name Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry Like Christmas The Heart of a Woman All God’s Children Need Traveling Shoes A Song Flung Up to Heaven Mom & Me & Mom ESSAYS Wouldn’t Take Nothing for My Journey Now Even the Stars Look Lonesome Letter to My Daughter POETRY Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water ’fore I Diiie Oh Pray My Wings Are Gonna Fit Me Well And Still I Rise Shaker, Why Don’t You Sing? I Shall Not Be Moved On the Pulse of Morning Phenomenal Woman A Brave and Startling Truth Amazing Peace Mother His Day Is Done CHILDREN’S BOOKS Poetry for Young People My Painted House, My Friendly Chicken, and Me Kofi and His Magic MAYA’S WORLD SERIES Angelina of Italy Izak of Lapland Mikale of Hawaii Renée Marie of France PICTURE BOOKS Love’s Exquisite Freedom Now Sheba Sings the Song Life Doesn’t Frighten Me COOKBOOKS Hallelujah! The Welcome Table Great Food, All Day Long COLLECTIONS The Complete Collected Poems of Maya Angelou The Collected Autobiographies of Maya Angelou Celebrations Rainbow in the Cloud Maya Angelou: The Complete Poetry

• From The Letter to the Hebrews (The New Daily Study Bible) (2002)

  That phrase ‘still once more’ signifies the removal of the things that are shaken, because they are merely created things, in order that the things which cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore let us give thanks because we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, a kingdom in which we must worship God acceptably, with reverence and with fear, for our God, too, is a consuming fire. H ERE, the writer begins with a contrast which is also a warning. Moses brought to earth the oracles of God. The word that he uses (chrēmatizein) implies that Moses was only the transmitter of these oracles, the mouthpiece through which God spoke; and yet anyone who broke these commandments did not escape punishment. On the other hand, there is Jesus. The word used of him (lalein) implies the direct speech of God. He was not merely the transmitter of God’s voice, he was God’s voice. If that is so, how much more will someone who refuses to obey him find punishment? If someone deserves to be condemned for neglecting the imperfect message of the law, how much more does that person deserve to be condemned for neglecting the perfect message of the gospel? Because the gospel is the full revelation of God, there is laid on those who hear it a double and a terrible responsibility; and their condemnation must be all the more if they neglect it. The writer to the Hebrews goes on to draw out another thought. When the law was given, the earth was shaken. ‘Now Mount Sinai was wrapped in smoke, because the Lord had descended upon it in fire; the smoke went up like the smoke of a kiln, while the whole mountain shook violently’ (Exodus 19:18). ‘Tremble, O earth, at the presence of the Lord’ (Psalm 114:7). ‘The earth quaked, the heavens poured down rain at the presence of God’ (Psalm 68:8). ‘The crash of your thunder was in the whirlwind; your lightnings lit up the world; the earth trembled and shook’ (Psalm 77:18). The writer to the Hebrews finds another reference to the shaking of the earth in Haggai 2:6. There, the Greek version of the Old Testament says: ‘Once again, in a little while [the Hebrew says “very soon”], I will shake the heavens and the earth and the sea and the dry land.’ The writer to the Hebrews takes this to be an announcement of the day when this earth shall pass away and the new age will begin.

• From The Letter to the Hebrews (The New Daily Study Bible) (2002)

  They will submit to the discipline of training because of the end in view. If life is only a day-to-day matter of routine things, we may well sink into a policy of drifting; but, if we are on the way to heaven’s crown, our efforts must always be the very best we can offer. (2) We need fortitude . Perseverance is one of the great unromantic virtues. Most people can start well, and almost everyone can keep going intermittently. To everyone at some time or other, strength and inspiration come so that we rise above things as if we had wings; in the moment of the great effort, everyone can run and not be weary; but the greatest gift of all is to walk on steadily and not to faint. (3) We need the memory of the end . The writer to the Hebrews quotes a passage from Habakkuk 2:3. The prophet tells his people that, if they hold fast to their loyalty, God will see them through their present situation. The victory comes only to those who hold on. To the writer to the Hebrews, life was a journey that made its way to the presence of Christ. It was therefore never something that could be allowed to drift; it was its end which made the process of life all-important, and only those who endured to the end would be saved. Here is a summons never to be less than our best, and always to remember that the end comes. If life is the road to Christ, no one can afford to miss it or to stop half-way. THE THREAT AT THE HEART OF THINGS Hebrews 10:26–31 For, if we deliberately sin after we have received full knowledge of the truth, no sacrifice for sin is left. All that we can expect is to wait in terror for judgment and for that flaming wrath which will consume the adversaries of God. Anyone who regards the law of Moses as a dead letter dies without pity on the evidence of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, do you think, that man will be deemed worthy who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, who has failed to regard the blood of the new covenant, with which he was made fit for God’s presence, as a sacred thing, and who has insulted the Spirit through whom God’s grace comes to us? For we know who it was who said: ‘Vengeance belongs to me; it is I who will repay,’ and again: ‘The Lord will judge his people.’ It is a terrifying thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  Half the population looked like Tyrone Power and Dolores Del Rio, and the other half like Akim Tamiroff and Katina Paxinou, maybe only fatter and older. Dad gave no explanation as we drove through the border town and headed for the interior. Although surprised, I refused to indulge my curiosity by questioning him. After a few miles we were stopped by a uniformed guard. He and Dad exchanged familiar greetings and Dad got out of the car. He reached back into the pocket of the door and took a bottle of liquor into the guard's kiosk. They laughed and talked for over a half hour as I sat in the car and tried to translate the muffled sounds. Eventually they came out and walked to the car. Dad still had the bottle but it was only half full. He asked the guard if he would like to marry me. Their Spanish was choppier than my school version but I understood. My father added as an inducement the fact that I was only fifteen years old. At once the guard leaned into the car and caressed my cheek. I supposed that he thought before that I was not only ugly but old, too, and that now the knowledge that I was probably unused attracted him. He told Dad that he would marry me and we would have “many babies.” My father found that promise the funniest thing he had heard since we left home. (He had laughed uproariously when Dolores didn't answer my goodbye and I explained as we drove away that she hadn't heard.) The guard was not discouraged by my attempts to get away from his probing hands and I would have squirmed to the driver's seat had not Dad opened the door and got in. After many adiós's and bonitas and espositas Dad started the car, and we were on our grimy way again. Signs informed me that we were headed for Ensenada. In those miles, along the twisted roads beside the steep mountain, I feared that I would never get back to America, civilization, English and wide streets again. He sipped from the bottle and sang snatches of Mexican songs as we climbed the tortuous mountain road. Our destination turned out not to be the town of Ensenada, after all, but about five miles out of the city limits. We pulled up in the dirt yard of a cantina where half-clothed children chased mean-looking chickens around and around. The noise of the car brought women to the door of the ramshackle building but didn't distract the single-minded activity of either the grubby kids or the scrawny fowls. A woman's voice sang out, “Baylee, Baylee.” And suddenly a claque of women crowded to the door and overflowed into the yard. Dad told me to get out of the car and we went to meet the women. He explained quickly that I was his daughter, which everyone thought to be uncontrollably funny.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  I never had the nerve to go up to him. I was quite afraid that if I tried to say, “Hello, Reverend Thomas,” I would choke on the sin of mocking him. After all, the Bible did say, “God is not mocked,” and the man was God's representative. He used to say to me, “Come on, little sister. Come and get this blessing.” But I was so afraid and I also hated him so much that my emotions mixed themselves up and it was enough to start me crying. Momma told him time after time, “Don't pay her no mind, Elder Thomas, you know how tender-hearted she is.” He ate the leftovers from our dinner and he and Uncle Willie discussed the developments of the church programs. They talked about how the present minister was attending to his flock, who got married, who died and how many children had been born since his last visit. Bailey and I stood like shadows in the rear of the Store near the coal-oil tank, waiting for the juicy parts. But when they were ready to talk about the latest scandal, Momma sent us to her bedroom with warnings to have our Sunday School lesson perfectly memorized or we knew what we could expect. We had a system that never failed. I would sit in the big rocking chair by the stove and rock occasionally and stamp my feet. I changed voices, now soft and girlish, then a little deeper like Bailey's. Meanwhile, he would creep back into the Store. Many times he came flying back to sit on the bed and to hold the open lesson book just before Momma suddenly filled the doorway. “You children get your lesson good, now. You know all the other children looks up to you all.” Then, as she turned back into the Store Bailey followed right on her footsteps to crouch in the shadows and listen for the forbidden gossip. Once, he heard how Mr. Coley Washington had a girl from Lewisville staying in his house. I didn't think that was so bad, but Bailey explained that Mr. Washington was probably “doing it” to her. He said that although “it” was bad just about everybody in the world did it to somebody, but no one else was supposed to know that. And once, we found out about a man who had been killed by whitefolks and thrown into the pond. Bailey said the man's things had been cut off and put in his pocket and he had been shot in the head, all because the whitefolks said he did “it” to a white woman. Because of the kinds of news we filched from those hushed conversations, I was convinced that whenever Reverend Thomas came and Momma sent us to the back room they were going to discuss whitefolks and “doing it.” Two subjects about which I was very dim.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  He said nothing. I knew when I saw him that it would be useless to ask anything while he was in that state. It meant that he had seen or heard of something so ugly or frightening that he was paralyzed as a result. He explained when we were smaller that when things were very bad his soul just crawled behind his heart and curled up and went to sleep. When it awoke, the fearful thing had gone away. Ever since we read The Fall of the House of Usher, we had made a pact that neither of us would allow the other to be buried without making “absolutely positively sure” (his favorite phrase) that the person was dead. I also had to swear that when his soul was sleeping I would never try to wake it, for the shock might make it go to sleep forever. So I let him be, and after a while Momma had to let him alone too. I waited on customers, and walked around him or leaned over him and, as I suspected, he didn't respond. When the spell wore off he asked Uncle Willie what colored people had done to white people in the first place. Uncle Willie, who never was one for explaining things because he took after Momma, said little except that “colored people hadn't even bothered a hair on whitefolks' heads.” Momma added that some people said that whitefolks had come over to Africa (she made it sound like a hidden valley on the moon) and stole the colored people and made them slaves, but nobody really believed it was true. No way to explain what happened “blows and scores” ago, but right now they had the upper hand. Their time wasn't long, though. Didn't Moses lead the children of Israel out of the bloody hands of Pharaoh and into the Promised Land? Didn't the Lord protect the Hebrew children in the fiery furnace and didn't my Lord deliver Daniel? We only had to wait on the Lord. Bailey said he saw a man, a colored man, whom nobody had delivered. He was dead. (If the news hadn't been so important, we would have been visited with one of Momma's outbursts and prayers. Bailey was nearly blaspheming.) He said, “The man was dead and rotten. Not stinking but rotten.” Momma ordered, “Ju, watch your tongue.” Uncle Willie asked, “Who, who was it?” Bailey was just tall enough to clear his face over the cash register. He said, “When I passed the calaboose, some men had just fished him out of the pond. He was wrapped in a sheet, all rolled up like a mummy, then a white man walked over and pulled the sheet off. The man was on his back but the white man stuck his foot under the sheet and rolled him over on the stomach.”

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  Then there was the pain. A breaking and entering when even the senses are torn apart. The act of rape on an eight-year-old body is a matter of the needle giving because the camel can't. The child gives, because the body can, and the mind of the violator cannot. I thought I had died—I woke up in a white-walled world, and it had to be heaven. But Mr. Freeman was there and he was washing me. His hands shook, but he held me upright in the tub and washed my legs. “I didn't mean to hurt you, Ritie. I didn't mean it. But don't you tell … Remember, don't you tell a soul.” I felt cool and very clean and just a little tired. “No, sir, Mr. Freeman, I won't tell.” I was somewhere above everything “It's just that I'm so tired I'll just go and lay down a while, please,” I whispered to him. I thought if I spoke out loud, he might become frightened and hurt me again. He dried me and handed me my bloomers. “Put these on and go to the library. Your momma ought to be coming home soon. You just act natural.” Walking down the street, I felt the wet on my pants, and my hips seemed to be coming out of their sockets. I couldn't sit long on the hard seats in the library (they had been constructed for children), so I walked by the empty lot where Bailey was playing ball, but he wasn't there. I stood for a while and watched the big boys tear around the dusty diamond and then headed home. After two blocks, I knew I'd never make it. Not unless I counted every step and stepped on every crack. I had started to burn between my legs more than the time I'd wasted Sloan's Liniment on myself. My legs throbbed, or rather the insides of my thighs throbbed, with the same force that Mr. Freeman's heart had beaten. Thrum … step … thrum … step … STEP ON THE CRACK… thrum … step. I went up the stairs one at a, one at a, one at a time. No one was in the living room, so I went straight to bed, after hiding my red-and-yellow-stained drawers under the mattress. When Mother came in she said, “Well, young lady, I believe this is the first time I've seen you go to bed without being told. You must be sick.” I wasn't sick, but the pit of my stomach was on fire—how could I tell her that? Bailey came in later and asked me what the matter was. There was nothing to tell him. When Mother called us to eat and I said I wasn't hungry, she laid her cool hand on my forehead and cheeks. “Maybe it's the measles. They say they're going around the neighborhood.” After she took my temperature she said, “You have a little fever. You've probably just caught them.”

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  His twang jogged in the brittle air. From the side of the Store, Bailey and I heard him say to Momma, “Annie, tell Willie he better lay low tonight. A crazy nigger messed with a white lady today. Some of the boys'll be coming over here later.” Even after the slow drag of years, I remember the sense of fear which filled my mouth with hot, dry air, and made my body light. The “boys”? Those cement faces and eyes of hate that burned the clothes off you if they happened to see you lounging on the main street downtown on Saturday. Boys? It seemed that youth had never happened to them. Boys? No, rather men who were covered with graves' dust and age without beauty or learning. The ugliness and rottenness of old abominations. If on Judgment Day I were summoned by St. Peter to give testimony to the used-to-be sheriff's act of kindness, I would be unable to say anything in his behalf. His confidence that my uncle and every other Black man who heard of the Klan's coming ride would scurry under their houses to hide in chicken droppings was too humiliating to hear. Without waiting for Momma's thanks, he rode out of the yard, sure that things were as they should be and that he was a gentle squire, saving those deserving serfs from the laws of the land, which he condoned. Immediately, while his horse's hoofs were still loudly thudding the ground, Momma blew out the coal-oil lamps. She had a quiet, hard talk with Uncle Willie and called Bailey and me into the Store. We were told to take the potatoes and onions out of their bins and knock out the dividing walls that kept them apart. Then with a tedious and fearful slowness Uncle Willie gave me his rubber-tipped cane and bent down to get into the now-enlarged empty bin. It took forever before he lay down flat, and then we covered him with potatoes and onions, layer upon layer, like a casserole. Grandmother knelt praying in the darkened Store. It was fortunate that the “boys” didn't ride into our yard that evening and insist that Momma open the Store. They would have surely found Uncle Willie and just as surely lynched him. He moaned the whole night through as if he had, in fact, been guilty of some heinous crime. The heavy sounds pushed their way up out of the blanket of vegetables and I pictured his mouth pulling down on the right side and his saliva flowing into the eyes of new potatoes and waiting there like dew drops for the warmth of morning.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  “Well, I wasn't sure, so I figured better open 'em, 'cause it could have been, well, either one. I did, and the first thing, I saw a little baby angel. It was just as fat as a butterball, and laughing, eyes blue, blue, blue.” Uncle Willie asked, “A baby angel?” “Yes, sir, and it was laughing right in my face. Then I heard this long moan, ‘Agh-h-h-.’ Well, as you say, Sister Henderson, we been together over forty years. I know Florida's voice. I wasn't scared right then. I called ‘Florida?’ Then that angel laughed harder and the moan got louder.” I set my bowl down and got closer to Bailey. Mrs. Taylor had been a very pleasant woman, smiling all the time and patient. The only thing that jarred and bothered me when she came in the Store was her voice. Like near-deaf people, she screamed, half not hearing what she was saying and partly hoping her listeners would reply in kind. That was when she was living. The thought of that voice coming out of the grave and all the way down the hill from the cemetery and hanging over my head was enough to straighten my hair. “Yes, sir.” He was looking at the stove and the red glow fell on his face. It seemed as if he had a fire going inside his head. “First I called, ‘Florida, Florida. What do you want?’ And that devilish angel kept on laughing to beat the band.” Mr. Taylor tried to laugh and only succeeded in looking frightened. “ ‘I want some …’ That's when she said ‘I want some.’ ” He made his voice sound like the wind, if the wind had bronchial pneumonia. He wheezed, “ ‘I want some children.’ ” Bailey and I met halfway on the drafty floor. Momma said, “Now, Brother Taylor, could be you was dreaming. You know, they say whatever you goes to bed with on your mind …” “No, ma'am, Sister Henderson, I was as wide awake as I am right now.” “Did she let you see her?” Uncle Willie had a dreamy look on his face. “No, Willie, all I seed was that fat little white baby angel. But wasn't no mistaking that voice … ‘I want some children.’ ” The cold wind had frozen my feet and my spine, and Mr. Taylor's impersonation had chilled my blood. Momma said, “Sister, go bring the long fork to take the potatoes out.” “Ma'am?” Surely she didn't mean the long fork that hung on the wall behind the kitchen stove—a scary million miles away. “I said, go get the fork. The potatoes are burning.” I unwound my legs from the gripping fear and almost tripped onto the stove. Momma said, “That child would stumble over the pattern in a rug. Go on, Brother Taylor, did she say any more?”

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  Like most self-pitying people, I had very little pity for my relatives' anxiety. If something indeed had happened to Bailey, Uncle Willie would always have Momma, and Momma had the Store. Then, after all, we weren't their children. But I would be the major loser if Bailey turned up dead. For he was all I claimed, if not all I had. The bath water was steaming on the cooking stove, but Momma was scrubbing the kitchen table for the umpteenth time. “Momma,” Uncle Willie called and she jumped. “Momma.” I waited in the bright lights of the Store, jealous that someone had come along and told these strangers something about my brother and I would be the last to know. “Momma, why don't you and Sister walk down to meet him?” To my knowledge Bailey's name hadn't been mentioned for hours, but we all knew whom he meant. Of course. Why didn't that occur to me? I wanted to be gone. Momma said, “Wait a minute, little lady. Go get your sweater, and bring me my shawl.” It was darker in the road than I'd thought it would be. Momma swung the flashlight's arc over the path and weeds and scary tree trunks. The night suddenly became enemy territory, and I knew that if my brother was lost in this land he was forever lost. He was eleven and very smart, that I granted, but after all he was so small. The Bluebeards and tigers and Rippers could eat him up before he could scream for help. Momma told me to take the light and she reached for my hand. Her voice came from a high hill above me and in the dark my hand was enclosed in hers. I loved her with a rush. She said nothing—no “Don't worry” or “Don't get tender-hearted.” Just the gentle pressure of her rough hand conveyed her own concern and assurance to me. We passed houses which I knew well by daylight but couldn't recollect in the swarthy gloom. “Evening, Miz Jenkins.” Walking and pulling me along. “Sister Henderson? Anything wrong?” That was from an outline blacker than the night. “No, ma'am. Not a thing Bless the Lord.” By the time she finished speaking we had left the worried neighbors far behind. Mr. Willie Williams' Do Drop Inn was bright with furry red lights in the distance and the pond's fishy smell enveloped us. Momma's hand tightened and let go, and I saw the small figure plodding along, tired and old-mannish. Hands in his pockets and head bent, he walked like a man trudging up the hill behind a coffin.

• From I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings (1969)

  It would have been easier to see her through the gauze, but instead I looked down on the stark face that seemed suddenly so empty and evil. It knew secrets that I never wanted to share. The cheeks had fallen back to the ears and a solicitous mortician had put lipstick on the black mouth. The scent of decay was sweet and clasping. It groped for life with a hunger both greedy and hateful. But it was hypnotic. I wanted to be off but my shoes had glued themselves to the floor and I had to hold on to the sides of the coffin to remain standing. The unexpected halt in the moving line caused the children to press upon each other, and whispers of no small intent reached my ears. “Move along, Sister, move along.” It was Momma. Her voice tugged at my will and someone pushed from the rear, so I was freed. Instantly I surrendered myself to the grimness of death. The change it had been able to effect in Mrs. Taylor showed that its strength could not be resisted. Her high-pitched voice, which parted the air in the Store, was forever stilled, and the plump brown face had been deflated and patted flat like a cow's ordurous dropping. The coffin was carried on a horse-drawn wagon to the cemetery, and all the way I communed with death's angels, questioning their choice of time, place and person. For the first time the burial ceremony had meaning for me. “Ashes to ashes and dust to dust.” It was certain that Mrs. Taylor was returning to the earth from whence she came. In face, upon considering, I concluded that she had looked like a mud baby, lying on the white satin of her velvet coffin. A mud baby, molded into form by creative children on a rainy day, soon to run back into the loose earth. The memory of the grim ceremony had been so real to me that I was surprised to look up and see Momma and Uncle Willie eating by the stove. They were neither anxious nor hesitant, as if they knew a man has to say what he has to say. But I didn't want to hear any of it, and the wind, allying itself with me, threatened the chinaberry tree outside the back door. “Last night, after I said my prayers, I lay down on the bed. Well, you know it's the same bed she died on.” Oh, if he'd shut up. Momma said, “Sister, sit down and eat your soup. Cold night like this you need something hot in your stomach. Go on, Brother Taylor. Please.” I sat down as near Bailey as possible. “Well, something told me to open my eyes.” “What kind of something?” Momma asked, not laying down her spoon. “Yes, sir,” Uncle Willie explained, “there can be a good something and there can be a bad something.”