His Day is Done

Soo like...How are you? Sorry,I meant HEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEY,how've ya'll been for the past decade? No really,it feels like a decade since I've actually been ouchea,you know,like are ya'll good? GREAT:)I've been okay hey...uuuhm...not exactly but yes, I'm happy. The past days have been a "WOW"...like six emotions in a second. The passing of one of the most powerful yet so humble icons,uTata Nelson Mandela,I mean I don't even have to get started. It's sad that he had to leave but refreshing that he has now gone to a better place (although I'm sure he'd have opted to stay for the love he has for children). We expected it but we were never prepared for it...wow. I was watching the state burial yesterday and watched the repeat last night before I took off to bed and I realised something. The way people spoke about uTata,that closeness in their words,like they knew him personally..that is what we should strive for..Humanity. To have a bond so strong with each other,we must feel like we've met physically. As a universe we're so divided and some people of the same soil haven't found unity yet,it's sad. Let's keep them in prayer.I hope we all learned something(out of sooo many) from the beautiful well-lived iconic life of Madiba.
This is Maya Angelou's poem for Madiba and some material from him about first meeting her in Cairo in 1962, when he was on his clandestine trip through Africa and to London.

His day is done.
Is done.
The news came on the wings of a wind, reluctant to carry its burden.
Nelson Mandela’s day is done.
The news, expected and still unwelcome, reached us in the United States, and suddenly our world became somber.
Our skies were leadened.

His day is done.
We see you, South African people standing speechless at the slamming of that final door through which no traveler returns.
Our spirits reach out to you Bantu, Zulu, Xhosa, Boer.
We think of you and your son of Africa, your father, your one more wonder of the world.

We send our souls to you as you reflect upon your David armed with a mere stone, facing down the mighty Goliath.

Your man of strength, Gideon, emerging triumphant.

Although born into the brutal embrace of Apartheid, scarred by the savage atmosphere of racism, unjustly imprisoned in the bloody maws of South African dungeons.

Would the man survive? Could the man survive?

His answer strengthened men and women around the world.

In the Alamo, in San Antonio, Texas, on the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco, in Chicago’s Loop, in New Orleans Mardi Gras, in New York City’s Times Square, we watched as the hope of Africa sprang through the prison’s doors.

His stupendous heart intact, his gargantuan will hale and hearty.

He had not been crippled by brutes, nor was his passion for the rights of human beings diminished by twenty-seven years of imprisonment.

Even here in America, we felt the cool, refreshing breeze of freedom.

When Nelson Mandela took the seat of Presidency in his country where formerly he was not even allowed to vote we were enlarged by tears of pride, as we saw Nelson Mandela’s former prison guards invited, courteously, by him to watch from the front rows his inauguration.

We saw him accept the world’s award in Norway with the grace and gratitude of the Solon in Ancient Roman Courts, and the confidence of African Chiefs from ancient royal stools.

No sun outlasts its sunset, but it will rise again and bring the dawn.

Yes, Mandela’s day is done, yet we, his inheritors, will open the gates wider for reconciliation, and we will respond generously to the cries of Blacks and Whites, Asians, Hispanics, the poor who live piteously on the floor of our planet.

He has offered us understanding.
We will not withhold forgiveness even from those who do not ask.
Nelson Mandela’s day is done, we confess it in tearful voices, yet we lift our own to say thank you.

Thank you our Gideon, thank you our David, our great courageous man.

We will not forget you, we will not dishonor you, we will remember and be glad that you lived among us, that you taught us, and that you loved us all.

This video was produced by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of International Information Programs in December 2013.

Transcript about Dr Maya Angelou and Nelson Mandela's first meeting her in Cairo in 1962, when he was on his clandestine trip through Africa and to London.
MANDELA: That’s right. I also met Maya Angelou over there [Cairo]
STENGEL: Yes, she was married to the PAC
MANDELA: Yes, Vusumzi Make
STENGEL: Did you see her when you were in Washington [for Clinton's inauguration]?
MANDELA: No, man, but I phoned, I spoke to her. Remember. Oh, I see, you were not there. She was there, you see, because she read the poem.
STENGEL: Right.
MANDELA: Yes. But I didn't meet her – she was far away from me, she was right up at the podium. And after reciting that poem, you remember, Clinton embraced her, kissed her. Then I phoned her – I traced her at her hotel and I spoke to her.
STENGEL: Aha.
MANDELA: But I was too busy, you know, to go and see her or to ask her to see me, you know? I was too busy and ...
STENGEL: Did she remember the time that you had met?
MANDELA: Oh, yes, no, no, she remembered that. She remembered it, she remembered it. No, I spent some time in her house, in their house. Mmm. And we had arranged that when I come back we should start corresponding, but I was arrested shortly after I had returned.
Source: www.nelsonmandela.org/news/entry/dr.-maya-angelou-his-day-is-done-a-tribute-poem-for-nelson-mandela


Beijos,