Maya Angelou was an acclaimed writer and civil rights activist who reached a wide audience through her works. Although she is perhaps best known for her autobiographical prose, her poetry changed the landscape of feminist writing, introducing a new idea of ​​celebrating self-definition and individuality as an integral part of realization of liberation and free will. plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get the original essay. Her poem Woman Work describes a woman's life as akin to that of a slave. While the idea is latent throughout most of the poem, its conception becomes quite manifest with the mention of cotton picking. Part of the poem reads like a list with a breathless rhythm, an indication of the tedious life of a woman. The rhyme scheme is not regular, but exists in one part of the poem to further speed up the pace of the poem. This rhythm of the poem is representative of a woman's life, the woman having no time to stop; the list of his works seems to go on and on. In the following lines, this idea is particularly important. I have the children to take care of The clothes to mend The floor to clean The food to buy Then the chicken to fry The baby to dry I have company to feed The garden to weed I have shirts to press The little ones little ones to dressThe cutting boxI have to clean this cabinThen take care of the sickAnd the cotton to pick.In these lines, the poet depicts the life of a woman. This part of the poem sounds like someone is reading it breathlessly. A woman's labors range from her domestic duties, such as caring for children and running errands, as well as her slave duties, such as picking cotton. It shows the kind of lives that women, especially black women, have been forced to lead, condemned to live on the margins. The idea of ​​a double colonization of third world women comes to mind when the reader sees the part about picking up women. cotton. African women face discrimination based on race and gender. They have therefore been pushed to the very margins of society, deprived of any voice or action that “Others” from different demographic groups might have. The pace of the poem then slows in the next stanza, and a sense of relief is communicated in the next stanza. following lines: Shine on me, sun Rain on me, rain Fall softly, drops of dew And refresh my brow again. Storm, blow me from here With your fiercest wind Let me float in the sky until I can rest again. Fall softly, snowflakes Cover me in white Icy cold kisses and Let me rest tonight.Sun, rain, curving skyMountain, oceans, leaves and stonesBright stars, glow of the moonYou are all I can call mine. The speaker finally seems to find some rest. What's interesting is that it seems like nature is his only escape. Where humanity has condemned her to a life of servitude, nature offers her catharsis. One of the very significant themes that emerges in this part of the poem is that of the binary between nature and humanity. Nature does not discriminate and provides the only solace the speaker can find. From this poem many deductions can be drawn. It is very clear from the lines of the first stanza that the poet wishes to establish a parallel between the life of a woman and that of a slave. both having been marginalized in terms of suffering. So often we forget that there is an intersection between gender and racial bias..