Raw Space Culture Gallery
2031 Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Blvd. (Seventh Ave. between 121st & 122nd Sts.)
Tuesday, June 3, $10, 6:30
212-694-2887
www.facebook.com/RawSpaceNYC
www.mayaangelou.com
“The caged bird sings / with a fearful trill / of things unknown / but longed for still / and his tune is heard / on the distant hill / for the caged bird / sings of freedom.” So wrote Mississippi-born poet, teacher, activist, and artist Dr. Maya Angelou, who passed away on May 28 at the age of eighty-six. “She was a warrior for equality, tolerance, and peace,” her family said in a statement. Dr. Angelou, who wrote such books and poems as I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, I Shall Not Be Moved, and Still I Rise, had a mellifluous voice that was like music rising to the heavens, something the whole world got to hear when she recited “On the Pulse of Morning” at the January 1993 inauguration of President Bill Clinton. On June 3, Angelou’s life and career will be celebrated at “Globally Speaking,” a new open-mic poetry and conversation series at Raw Space on Adam Clayton Powell Jr. Blvd. The evening will include rare video clips of Angelou and an open discussion about I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Dr. Angelou is also being honored with the exhibition “Phenomenal Woman: Maya Angelou, 1928-2014,” which continues through June 30 at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture on Malcolm X Blvd. and consists of handwritten and typed drafts of her works, letters, portraits, and more from the Maya Angelou Papers.