When Great Trees Fall By Maya Angelou

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When great trees fall,
 rocks on distant hills shudder,
 lions hunker down
 in tall grasses,
 and even elephants
 lumber after safety.



When great trees fall
 in forests,
 small things recoil into silence,
 their senses
 eroded beyond fear.



When great souls die,
 the air around us becomes
 light, rare, sterile.
 We breathe, briefly. Our eyes, briefly,
 see with
 a hurtful clarity.
 Our memory, suddenly sharpened,
 examines,
 gnaws on kind words
 unsaid,
 promised walks
 never taken.


Great souls die and
 our reality, bound to
 them, takes leave of us.
 Our souls,
 dependent upon their
 nurture,
 now shrink, wizened.
 Our minds, formed
 and informed by their
 radiance,
fall away.
 We are not so much maddened
 as reduced to the unutterable ignorance
of dark, cold
 caves.



And when great souls die,
 after a period peace blooms,
 slowly and always
 irregularly. Spaces fill
 with a kind of
 soothing electric vibration.
 Our senses, restored, never
 to be the same, whisper to us.
 They existed. They existed.
 We can be. Be and be
 better. For they existed.

― Maya Angelou

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Playlist from online exhibit: “Heroes: Principles of African Greatness”

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Artwork credits

Headrest Luba artist Democratic Republic of the Congo 86-12-14 Mask Chokwe artist Democratic Republic of the Congo 85-15-20 Butterfly mask Nuna artist Burkina Faso 2005-6-47 Toussaint Louverture Ousmane Sow Senegal 2009-8-1 Photograph Zanele Muholi, South Africa 2018-17-1

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