Love Liberates
“Love liberates. It doesn’t just hold- that’s just ego. Love liberates. It doesn’t bind. Love says, ‘I love you. I love you if you’re in China. I love you if you’re across town. I love you if you’re in Harlem. I love you. I would like to be near you. I’d like to have you arms around me. I’d like to hear your voice in my ear. But that’s not possible now, so I love you. Go.” – Maya Angelou
Transcript of Maya Angelou’s words with emphasis
Oh I am grateful to have been loved, and to be loved now, and to be able to love because that liberates. Love liberates. It doesn’t just hold, that’s ego. Love liberates.
When my son was born, I was 17. My mother had a huge house – 14 room house. At 17 I went to her and said, “I’m leaving” and she said, “you’re leaving my house” She had live-in help. I said “yes, I found a job, and I’ve got a room with cooking privileges down the hall, and the landlady will be my babysitter.” She asked, “you’re leaving my house” I said, “yes, ma’am” “And you’re taking the baby” I said, “yes, ma’am” She said, “alright, remember this: when you step over my door sill, you’ve been raised, you know the difference between right and wrong – do right. Don’t let anybody raise you or make you change. And remember this: you can always come home.”
I went home every time life slammed me down, made me call it Uncle, I went home with my baby. My mother never once acted as I told you so. She said, “Oh! Baby’s home! Oh my darling! Momma’s gonna cook you something, Mother’s gonna make this for you!” Love. She liberated me to life.
She continued to do that. When my son might have been five years old, my mother would pick him up all the time and feed him. I went to her once a month and she would cook for me. So one day, I went to her house and she’d cooked red rice which I loved. After we finished eating, we walked down a hill and she started to cross the street and she said, “Wait a minute, baby,” (I was 22 years old) she said, “Wait a minute, baby…you know, I think you’re the greatest woman I have ever met.” She said, “Mary McLeod Bethune, Eleanor Roosevelt and my mother, you’re in that category.” Then she said, “give me a kiss,” I gave her a kiss and I got onto the streetcar. I can remember the way the sun fell on the wooden seats.
I sat there and I thought about her. I thought, suppose she’s right. She’s intelligent and she said she’s ‘too mean to lie,’ so suppose I am going to be somebody. She released me. She freed me to say I may have something within me that would be of value. Maybe not just to me.
That’s it. That’s love.
When she was in her final sickness I went out to San Francisco, the doctors said she had three weeks to live. I asked her “would you come to North Carolina” and she said, “yes!” She had emphysema and lung cancer. I brought her to my home.
She lived for a year and a half. And when she was finally, finally, in extremis, she was oxygen, and fighting cancer for her life. And I remember her liberating me, and I said I hope I’ll be able to liberate her. She deserved that from me. She deserved a great daughter and she got one.
So in her last days I said, now I understand that some people need permission to go. As I understand it, you may have done what God put you here to do. You were a great worker. You must have been a great lover because a lot of men and, if I’m not wrong, a couple of women, risked their lives to love you. You were a piss-poor mother of small children, but you were a great, great mother of young adults. And if you need permission to go, I liberate you.
I went back to my house and something said, go back, I was in my pajamas. I jumped in my car and ran, and the nurse said, “she’s just gone.”
You see love liberates. It doesn’t bind. Love says, I love you. Love says, I love you if you’re in China, I love you if you’re cross town, I love you in Harlem, I love you. I would like to be near you. I’d like to have your arms around me, I like to hear the voice in my ear. But that’s not possible now, so I love you. Go.
