“Still I Rise” is a poem by the American civil rights activist and writer Maya Angelou.

One of
Angelou's most acclaimed works, the poem was published in Angelou’s third poetry
collection And Still I Rise in 1978. Broadly speaking, the poem is an assertion of the dignity and
resilience of marginalized people in the face of oppression. Because Angelou often wrote about
blackness and black womanhood, "Still I Rise" can also be read more specifically as a critique of
anti-black racism.

o “Still I Rise” Summary

 You have the ability to shape how history remembers me with your hurtful, warped

lies. You have the power to walk all over me, crushing me into the dirt itself. But even so,

I will rise up from the ground just as dust rises from the earth.

Does my bold and cheeky attitude offend you? Why are you so miserable? Maybe it's

because of the confident way I walk, as if I had oil wells right in my living room.

I am like the moon and the sun, the rises of which are as inevitable as the rise of ocean

tides. Just like high hopes, I will keep rising.

Were you hoping to see me looking sad and defeated? Did you want to see me in a

submissive posture, with my head bent and eyes looking down rather than up at you? Did

you want to see my shoulders slouching down in the same way that tears fall down, my

body having been weakened by all my intense sobbing?

Is my pride making you mad? Are you so upset because I am so happy and joyful that it

seems as though I must have gold mines in my own backyard?

 You have the ability to shoot at me with your words, which are like bullets. You have the

ability to cut me with your sharp glare. You may even kill me with your

hatred. Nevertheless, just as the air keeps rising, I will keep rising.

Does my sex appeal make you upset? Are you taken aback by the fact that I dance as

though I have precious gems between my legs?

I rise up out of history's shameful act of slavery. I rise up from this deeply painful past. I

am as vast and full of power as a dark ocean that rises and swells and carries in the tide.

I rise up, and in doing so leave behind all the darkness of terror and fear. I rise up, and in

doing so enter a bright morning that is full of joyful wonder. With the personal qualities

and grace I inherited from my ancestors, I embody the dreams and hopes of past enslaved

peoples. I will rise, and rise, and rise.

o “Still I Rise” Themes

Defiance in the Face of Oppression

“Still I Rise” presents the bold defiance of the speaker, implied to be a black woman, in

the face of oppression. This oppressor, addressed throughout as “you,” is full of “bitter,

twisted lies” and “hatefulness” toward the speaker, and hopes to see the speaker “broken”
in both body and spirit. However, despite all the methods of the oppressor to “shoot,”

“cut,” or “kill” her, the speaker remains defiant by continuing to “rise” in triumph.

Angelou was a staunch civil rights activist, and “Still I Rise” can be taken as a powerful

statement specifically against anti-black racism in America. At the same time, its

celebration of dignity in the face of oppression feels universal, and can be applied to any

circumstance in which a marginalized person refuses to be broken by—and, indeed,

repeatedly rises above—prejudice and hatred.

Society relentlessly tries to humiliate and demean the speaker, who has little power to

fight back. The speaker acknowledges that society “may” enact violence upon her. It also

has the ability to write “lies” about the speaker and present them as facts. The speaker

does not have the ability to prevent any of this, and, in fact, the attempts to harm the

speaker only escalate as the poem continues. This “you” may crush the speaker into the

dirt; it may “shoot,” “cut,” and eventually even “kill” the speaker with “hatefulness.” An

oppressive society, the poem is saying, presents a clear and pressing danger to the

speaker’s body and mind.

Yet the speaker responds to this treatment not only by surviving, but by thriving—

something that provokes anger from her oppressor. The speaker wonders—her tone

tongue-in-cheek—why the oppressor is so “upset,” “offend[ed],” and “gloom[y].”

Perhaps, she proposes, it is because of her confident “walk,” generous “laugh[ter],” or

dazzling “dance.” In other words, the speaker presents her joy—her refusal to bend to the

speaker’s will—as its own act of defiance. Moreover, all of her acts are associated with

traditional signs of wealth in the form of “oil,” “gold,” and “diamonds.”

Regardless of the oppressor’s negative and hateful responses, the speaker continues to

prosper. The speaker even explicitly rejects the oppressor’s desire to “see [her] broken.”

The oppressor wants to elicit “lowered eyes,” “teardrops,” and “soulful cries” from the

speaker, to see her downtrodden. Thus simply living with joy, pride, and dignity is an act

of resistance against and triumph over oppression.

Indeed, the speaker “rise[s]” repeatedly over the oppressor’s violent hatred and prejudice.

The speaker’s rise is first compared to the rise of “dust,” a reference to the earth. Later,

her rise transforms from the rise of “dust” to “air,” which is located physically above the

earth. The progression of these comparisons over the course of the poem reinforces the

speaker’s rise over oppression. And just like the rise of “moons and … suns,” the

speaker’s rise is inevitable and unstoppable. Her dignity and strength are qualities that

society can’t touch, no matter how hard it tries. The speaker is thus able to ascend out of

“history’s shame” and “a past that’s rooted in pain,” both of which are particular

references to slavery, by living with pride and joy. Indeed, her rise—a powerful form of

resistance against oppression—is the ultimate “dream” and “hope” of oppressed peoples.

Given this context, the poem has clear and particular resonance for black Americans.

More broadly, the poem is a ringing assertion of the dignity of marginalized people and

an insistence on their ultimate, inevitable triumph over violence and hate.

Where this theme appears in the poem:

 Lines 1-4

 Lines 5-6

 Lines 7-8
  Line 9

 Lines 10-12

 Lines 13-16

 Lines 17-20

 Lines 21-24

 Lines 25-28

 Lines 29-32

 Line 40

The Power and Beauty of Blackness

Maya Angelou’s work often focused on the experience of being a black woman in

America. Read within that context, “Still I Rise” becomes more than a call for strength in

the face of hardship: it’s also a modern-day ode to the power and beauty of blackness.

Although the speaker’s racist society believes that black people’s lives and bodies are

less worthy than others', the speaker herself vehemently rejects that idea. The speaker

asserts her full humanity and also associates her body with symbols of value, such as “oil

wells,” “gold mines,” and “diamonds.” These comparisons implicitly critique racist and

sexist assumptions of beauty and power as being tied only to whiteness and masculinity,

respectively. Instead, the poem becomes an ode to black womanhood.

In a racist world, the poem implies, society continuously denies the full humanity of

black people. Society wishes to the speaker were “broken,” “cut,” or even “kill[ed].”
Rather than valuing the lives and humanity of black people, society actively hopes to

harm and destroy them. Society’s “shame[ful]” history of slavery was of course the

ultimate dehumanization; black people who were enslaved experienced unimaginable

“pain” and “nights of terror and fear” as any agency over their own lives and bodies was

taken away from them. The speaker references this history to illustrate how little society

has historically valued black life.

Nevertheless, the speaker insists on the inherent humanity, value, power, and beauty of

her black body. The speaker rises “like dust,” a subtle biblical allusion: in the Bible, God

created humans from “dust,” and humans return to “dust” once they die. By stating that

she is “like dust,” the speaker asserts her full humanity; she is as much a creation of God

as anyone else. The speaker also walks as though she possesses “oil wells,” laughs as

though she owns “gold mines,” and dances as though she has “diamonds” suggestively

placed between her thighs. These symbols are all objects of great value. Oil wells provide

their owners with wealth and, consequently, power. Gold and diamonds are expensive

and prized for their beauty. Thus, the speaker assigns value to her body and grants it

power and beauty regardless of what society says. In particular, the placement of the

diamonds “[a]t the meeting of … [her] thighs” speaks specifically to the speaker’s

womanhood. (The reference also feels distinctly autobiographical as Angelou once

worked as a nightclub dancer.) Taken as a whole, the lines declare and reclaim the

speaker’s body and power in her femininity as a black woman. The speaker also insists

that she is a "black ocean," a vast, powerful, and unstoppable figure.

 The speaker thus doesn't assert her strength in spite of her blackness, but rather insists

that her strength comes from her identity as a black person. And by subverting readers’

expectations of an ode and who or what it should praise, Angelou challenges the assumed

white gaze of her readership. Humanity, power, and beauty, Angelou declares, are

abundant in blackness and black womanhood.

Where this theme appears in the poem:

 Line 4

 Line 5

 Line 7

 Line 8

 Line 17

 Lines 19-20

 Lines 22-23

 Line 25

 Lines 27-28

 Line 29

 Line 31

 Lines 33-34

 Line 35

 Lines 39-40

o Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Still I Rise”

 Lines 1-4
You may write ...

... dust, I'll rise.

The first two lines of "Still I Rise" establish the antagonistic relationship between the

speaker, implied to be a black woman, and her oppressor, addressed throughout simply as

"you." The speaker accepts that her oppressor has the power to write "lies" about the

speaker and present them as historical facts. This suggests that the "you" here represents

society as a whole, and more specifically white society.

Historical narratives are typically shaped by the perspective of the powerful—and, in the

U.S., white people have long been those with the most power in society. The speaker is

thus alluding to the idea that the experiences of oppressed and marginalized peoples have

long been filtered through a distant and unsympathetic (if not outright racist) perspective.

The speaker here is thus talking back to a world that has tried to suppress her voice,

insisting that her truth and spirit will rise above whatever falsehoods a prejudiced society

wants to spread.

Furthermore, by addressing the oppressor figure as "you" through the use of apostrophe,

Angelou suggests the reader may also be implicated in racist social structures and

attitudes. Angelou thus asks her poem's readers to question their own privilege and

prejudices toward blackness.

The speaker also allows that her oppressor may step on her ("trod") and crush her into the

dirt. This oppressor clearly has little care for the speaker. And, as highlighted

through anaphora of the phrase "You may," the speaker has no power to literally stop

this from happening.

Nevertheless, the speaker will rise above this humiliation. In the fourth and final line of

the stanza, the speaker uses a simile to compare her rise to that of dust kicked up when

stamping on the ground. There is also a subtle biblical allusion in the image of this rising

dust: in the Bible, humans are said to be created by God from "dust" and to return to

"dust" upon death. By stating that she is "like dust," the speaker asserts that she, too, is a

creation of God and is equal to anyone else. In doing so, the speaker demands her

oppressor and society as a whole recognize her full humanity.

The meter of the first stanza is also worth noting. The first three lines contain a series

of trochees in its pattern of stressed-unstressed syllables:

... write me down in history

... bitter, twisted lies,

... trod me in the very dirt

The so-called "falling rhythm" of the trochees reflect the negativity of the first three lines,

namely the speaker's acknowledgement of her oppressor's ability to humiliate her.

However, the meter changes to iambic (unstressed-stressed) in the last line of the stanza:

But still, like dust, I'll rise.

The shift to "rising meter" not only reflects the "rise" of the speaker, but also stands in

direct contrast to the negative tone of the first three lines. The final spondee (stressed-

stressed) of "I'll rise" also adds extra strength and emphasis to this phrase.
 In terms of overall structure, this first and following six stanzas are all quatrains. Within

each quatrain, the second and fourth lines rhyme with one another, while the first and

third lines do not. In this first quatrain, the rhyme scheme is thus ABCB.

In rhyming "lies" with "rise," the poem emphasizes that the speaker is able to directly

counter the "lies" of the oppressor with her "rise." This emphasis reiterates the power of

the speaker's "rise."

In a larger sense, by establishing a formal structure at the beginning, the poem creates an

opportunity to later subvert that structure in defiance of the reader's expectations. This

subversion will be an interesting echo of the subversion in meter and tone within the first

stanza itself.

Imagery

This poem is filled with vivid imagery. To begin with, there is visual imagery in the very
beginning. Through this line, “But still, like dust, I’ll rise.” So, here the image of “dust” helps the
speaker to make her point. According to her, none can control the dust when the revolutionary
wind arrives. Likewise, she will rise like dust particles and blind those who trod her before.

The following stanzas contain some more images. For example, readers can find the image of oil
wells pumping oil. The third stanza has images of the moon, sun, and tides. In this stanza, she
depicts the tides that are springing high. It is compared to “hope”.

There is an image of a black individual who is in extreme distress. This image represents how
they were tortured and made silent by the unlawful fist. Angelou uses the images of “gold
mines” and “diamonds” to heighten the irony of this piece. Lastly, the “black ocean” unfolds
how powerful the speaker and her people are. Their greatness is like that of the immensity of the
ocean.

Symbolism

Angelou’s ‘Still I Rise’ is a symbolic poem. It contains several symbols that refer to different
ideas. For example, in the first stanza, the poet uses “dirt” as a symbol. It represents how the
black community was treated in history.

In the following stanzas, there are several symbolic references. These are “oil wells”, “gold
mines” and “diamonds”. They collectively refer to the resourcefulness of the speaker. Those
symbols do not deal with anything materialistic, rather they hint at her intellectual wealth.

In the fourth stanza, the moon and sun represent the speaker herself. While the upward
movement of tides symbolizes how hope springs in her heart concerning the future. Besides,
some phrases deal with the concept of slavery in this line, “Bowed head and lowered eyes.”

There is an important symbol of the “black ocean” in the eighth stanza. This ocean represents
black people. The speaker says, “I’m a black ocean”. Here, it acts as a symbol of energy and
immensity. The last stanza contains another symbol in the usage of the word “night”. It is a
symbol of fear, oppression, and pessimism.