Maya Angelou is one of America’s most famous and touching poets, as well as an avid writer of novels, essays and even several autobiographies. One of her most famous pieces is the free verse poem titled ‘Men.’ The poem has inspired numerous debates and explorations into Angelou’s meaning and purpose of the piece. A semi-autobiographical work, it reflects a young woman’s movement into sexual awareness and loss of innocence with violent, intense metaphorical phrasing.

The poem starts out describing an unidentified speaker, often thought to be Angelou herself, describing her desire to ‘watch behind the curtains’ at the men walking through the town. She is separated from men but inquisitive about them. From there, the poem branches into a metaphor describing her adventure out into the world of men. It compares women to eggs in the palms of men’s hands. It describes in vivid detail how a man’s hand fist gently holds, but then eventually crushes the woman. Maya ends on the note that, perhaps, she will hold the curtains open and simply watch the men, instead of getting close enough to be crushed. However, the poem also ends on the simple, undecided word of ‘maybe.’

The poem is most commonly thought to comment on the relationship between men and women as seen in Angelou’s eyes. First, there is almost a self-destructive desire on the part of the woman to see, know and get close to the ambiguous figure of man. As a young girl, even, she is desperate to interact with them. However, there is a dangerous aspect to men. They consume, crush and destroy women, often ridding them of their innocence. The metaphor in the poem of the crushed egg, for example, can almost directly relate to the losing of a woman’s virginity. Men, then, are seen as stealers of innocence as well as wonderful, mysterious creatures.

The piece comments mainly on sexual maturity and how it affects young women. At age 15, the speaker in ‘Men’ is longing to experience the mystery of man. However, by the end of the poem, the speaker is slightly older and jaded by the experience of her youth. She is therefore undecided on whether or not she wishes to pursue the men outside her window. The poem seems to support the idea that women’s virtue is crushed after they’ve experience men, and it is something they will never get back. At the same time, though, women crave – and continue to crave – men, despite this danger.