The Brave and Startling Truth
Maya Angelou read her poem, A Brave and Startling Truth, at the 50th anniversary commemoration of the United Nations. This is the first and last two stanzas:
We, this people, on a small and lonely planet
Traveling through casual space
Past aloof stars, across the way of indifferent suns
To a destination where all signs tell us
It is possible and imperative that we learn
A brave and startling truthWhen we come to it
We, this people, on this wayward, floating body
Created on this earth, of this earth
Have the power to fashion for this earth
A climate where every man and every woman
Can live freely without sanctimonious piety
Without crippling fearWhen we come to it
We must confess that we are the possible
We are the miraculous, the true wonder of this world
That is when, and only when
We come to it.
We really do appear to be totally alone, stranded in a vast indifferent universe as apparently the most valuable things within it. We appear to have won the largest cosmic lottery possible, millions of times in a row, to end up where we are today.
If that is the truth, as by all accounts it appears to be, you really do have to confess that the only thing that can craft new, meaningful possibility is us. The highest wonder and the most powerful miracle isn’t to be found anywhere around you — it is you.
Given this apparent fact, it is profound and startling, and wondrous and tragic, how we treat ourselves and each other. Perhaps the brave and startling truth, the final truth, is that the only thing that really matters in the universe is love — and all of the benefits that will result from that realization.
That is, when we come to it.
