Vanessa Richardson’s CARING is SHARING Literary List!
Hello friends! As I aforementioned I am starting my sharing is caring list. I am starting first with my literary list. I am considering posting my list every month. I am listing some delicious reads I’ve discovered. Some I may have read or want to read (I am forever in search of good reads and interviews) so here it is and in no particular order.
Note: I will continue to add on my list as there are many great reads out there. Some are hidden but I am determined to find them and share with you my friends: Because Sharing is Caring! *smiles*
The Grace Series by Kendra Norman Bellamy The Shack by William P. Young Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters' First 100 Years by Amy Hill Hearth, A. Elizabeth Delany, Sarah L. Delany Heart of the Hood by Eryk Hood It’s the Woman You Gave Me! by Shon Hyneman Better Than Ever by David and Jan Stoop, PH.D. My Time with God 15 minute devotional for the whole year Winter's Kisses by Pauline Evans Glorious by Bernice L. McFadden Desires of the Heart by Beverly Taylor Even Numbers by Barbara Grosvenor Desire at Will by Adrienna Turner Love Found Me by Vanessa Richardson Yesterday's Promise by Vanessa Miller Joy by Victoria Christopher Murray 25 Miles to Touching the Heart of God by Christel Lim Wings of Grace by Vanessa Davis Griggs Mirror Beware by Dream Sumore
I absolutely adore Maya Angelou. Words can not describe how much so. I remember years ago watching an episode of Showtime at the Apollo-- a show that show cased up-and-coming artists. There was a little girl around my age (ten) at the time. She was performing what I recall at the time, this soul stirring poem. I sat there glued to the television; thirsting for me. Inside I was screaming..." I want to do that. I want to say that poem."
The problem was; I was painfully shy as a child. I had much to say, but very much afraid to say it aloud. Besides, who'd want to listen to me anyways? The mind is a funny thing is it not? To succeed or fail--it takes a made up mind.
I vividly recall something within me stirring to life. It was to be on television, with the hopes of my friends watching me, or to even become famous. It was those words, penetrating in my ten-year-old heart. "Still I Rise. Still I Rise." The little girl's performance was mesmerizing. Now, several years later, it is that, I've never forgotten, that little girl; nor this wonderful poem "Still I Rise", written by Maya Angelou. My mind was made up! I would one day perform this piece, and I did! Oh, the process was not easy, it took bumps in the road, and yep, you've guessed it! A made up mind. :)
You may write me down in history
With your bitter, twisted lies,
You may trod me in the very dirt
But still, like dust, I'll rise.
Does my sassiness upset you?
Why are you beset with gloom?
'Cause I walk like I've got oil wells
Pumping in my living room.
Just like moons and like suns,
With the certainty of tides,
Just like hopes springing high,
Still I'll rise.
Did you want to see me broken?
Bowed head and lowered eyes?
Shoulders falling down like teardrops,
Weakened by my soulful cries.
Does my haughtiness offend you?
Don't you take it awful hard
'Cause I laugh like I got gold mines
Diggin' in my own back yard.
You may shoot me with your words,
You may cut me with your eyes,
You may kill me with your hatefulness,
But still, like air, I'll rise.
Does my sexiness upset you?
Does it come as a surprise
That I dance like I've got diamonds
At the meeting of my thighs?
Out of the huts of history's shame
I rise
Up from a past that's rooted in pain
I rise
I'm a black ocean, leaping and wide,
Welling and swelling I bear in the tide.
Leaving behind nights of terror and fear
I rise
Into a daybreak that's wondrously clear
I rise
Bringing the gifts my ancestors gave,
I am the dream and the hope of the slave.
I rise
I rise
I rise.
