Maya Angelou Was a Crappy Poet

Maya Angelou died today. She was perhaps the most famous shitty living poet in the U.S. Her overly sappy bits of strung together wistful feelings were like Little River Band lyrics, if Fat Oprah had ordered everybody to refer to Reminiscing as a work of sheer genius. Maya Angelou wrote like an unpolished freshman Lit major who just knew her words were meant to move people. Once everybody realized that Maya looked interesting and had a memorable delivery and that she was black, her insights into the beauty of the sun, and the sincerity of love, and the fact that time keeps on ticking ticking into the future were held in Emerson like regard. She quickly became a politically correct national treasure. You couldn’t have a graduation or Olympics or Presidential gala without Maya Angelou Captain Kirking some free verse ripped straight from the wisdom of a middle school girl who makes daisy necklaces and pencils hearts in her journal.

Beloveds, now we know that we know nothing, now that our bright and shining star can slip away from our fingertips like a puff of summer wind.

Without notice, our dear love can escape our doting embrace. Sing our songs among the stars and walk our dances across the face of the moon.

Maya wrote that for Michael Jackson upon his own death. The verses from Man in the Mirror are ten times as deep as that dribble. Her inauguration poem for Obama read like a Black History Month local TV station interstitial combined with a love letter to Our Lord and Savior. I have no ill personal feelings for Maya Angelou. Maybe in her private moments she too laughed at how seriously a white guilt ridden America accepted her crap as profound and gobbled up her ninety-seven autobiographies.

My great hope is to laugh as much as I cry; to get my work done and try to love somebody and have the courage to accept the love in return

Thanks, Maya, you’ve raised the bar for Hallmark ‘Words of Wisdom’ category forever more.

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