The Black Family
Pledge
by Maya Angelou
BECAUSE
we have forgotten our ancestors, our children no longer give us honor.
BECAUSE
we have lost the path our ancestors cleared kneeling in perilous undergrowth, our children cannot
find their way.
BECAUSE
we have banished the God of our ancestors, our children cannot pray.
BECAUSE
the old wails of our ancestors have faded beyond our hearing, our children cannot hear us crying.
BECAUSE
we have abandoned our wisdom of mothering and fathering, our befuddled children give birth to children
they neither want nor understand.
BECAUSE
we have forgotten how to love, the adversary is within our gates, an holds us up to the mirror of
the world shouting, "Regard the loveless"
Therefore
we pledge to bind ourselves to one another, to embrace our lowliest, to
keep company with our loneliest, to educate our illiterate, to feed our
starving, to clothe our ragged, to do all good things, knowing that we
are more than keepers of our brothers and sisters.
We ARE our
brothers and sisters.
IN HONOR
of those who toiled and implored God with golden tongues, and in gratitude to the same God who brought
us out of hopeless desolation, We make this pledge.
