‘Still I Rise by Maya Angelou

“You may shoot me with your words”

I think that the metaphor of this poem means that there will be people that disagree with her along the way but she will keep on going and having self belief. I think that this is significant to the poem because it is inspiring that she has gotten that far and she has also written a poem about it. The significance of this to the audience is that as well as telling her story she is also slightly bragging about how far she has come.

“Cause I walk like i’ve gotten oil wells pumping in my living room.”

This is meaning that she has so much success now and is loaded with money and come so far. This is significant because this also relates to her bragging to the audience because she has so much success as a black woman that has been through things that she didn’t deserve but she kept going until she rose above everyone else.

“You may write me down in history with your bitter twisted lies.”

I think this means that there has been lots of things said over her throughout her life and people that haven’t been by her side and believed in her but she had so much self belief to overcome that. This is significant to the poem because reading it out loud and showing how hateful everyone was would make her feel very powerful as now they are looking up to her. It is significant to the audience because for some of the audience, seeing someone that you haven’t believed in rising up and becoming an influencer to millions of people would cause a lot of regret and shame.