Maya Angelou, in her book Poems, presents a focused look at the experience of an African-American woman in the last half of the twentieth century. Her work is generally written from a gentle and accepting perspective with respect to the often harsh experience of blacks in America, rather than from an angry and revolutionary perspective. This is not to say that no poems express a bitterness at racism and its personal and social effects. Angelou is capable of such rage and expresses it in some poems, but in general her spiritual viewpoint leads her in most cases to try to find the best in the situation at hand. This general sweetness is the book's greatest weakness, but it is probably a weakness which Angelou can do nothing about, even if she wished to.
One of the major reasons that Angelou has had the kind of acclaim from the sociopolitical establishment in the United States (including reading poetry at President Clinton's first inauguration) is precisely that she is so good-natured and warm-hearted in her poetry. She is a black writer whom white readers can accept, can feel comfortable with, can feel unthreatened by. For other readers who want to feel the unbridled emotion of a poet fearlessly expressing darker and more troubling responses to the injustices of the world, other black female poets, such as Wanda Coleman, must be sought. Angelou's work is far "softer" on racial issues than that of even Langston Hughes, another black poet, and she seems downright passive compared to blatantly angry black writers such as Richard Wright, who she claims as a major influence.
The book provides a comprehensive look at Angelou's development as a poet, including works from four collections over her entire career, from 1971's Just Give Me a Cool Drink of Water 'fore I Diiie to 1983's Shaker, Why Don't You Sing? The earliest poems resemble the latest in their sad reflections on personal love lost. A bluesy quality pervades both "...