YAKEEB: #BABISHAI2018 SHORTLIST

 Yakeeb is a writer resident in Lagos, Nigeria. His work has appeared and is forthcoming in a number of literary journals including Ynaija, Arts & Africa and others, and he collaborates with other creatives on various projects across genres. He is currently looking to publish his completed chapbook manuscript. 

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 Q:        What was the process of writing your particular poem, Unholy Sermon Notes?

 A:        It is one of those poems that drops on you like bird poop, maybe in this case, it was a gift from God. The poem was written during a Sunday service that I felt very disconnected from.

Q:         What does poetry mean to you?

A:            Poetry for me is a portal to alternate universes, you can be in yours or get lost in someone else's. That encapsulates it all for me. To dig deeper is to examine the process and the emotions, I'll leave that to the academics.

Q:    What are your five year goals with your poetry?. 
 A:            Mastery of the art form, enough to teach it. A chapbook and a full-length collection that is special to nearly everyone who comes across them. Also, I intend to travel more so I'm able to write from a wider range of perspectives.

Q:         Which African poets are you keen on reading?

A:            I'm playing catch up at the moment in regards to poetry written by Africans, but I've spent some time reading Dami Ajayi & Efe Paul's poetry and I really like the themes they explore. I recently came across poems by Niyi Osundare, Gbenga Adesina, Bernard Binlin Dadié and Jonathan Kariara. I intend to gradually delve deeper and I'm excited about what I'm yet to discover.

Q:    What are some of the challenges you face with poetry?

A:            As a reader, there are times when I wrestle with the patience of taking it all in. There's also the issue of insight, you want to be sure you're in tune with what was expressed by the writer of the poem. As a writer, sometimes, the words that come to mind while writing or attempting to write do not genuinely describe what I feel. Also, navigating the layers of vulnerability can be tedious.

Q:         Is there anything of importance you would like to share with literature teachers, who are reading this?

A:         From a general point of view, passion is enticing. I think you're very likely to bring the best out of students when you teach with love. I recommend watching Dead Poets Society, a 1989 movie directed by Peter Weir.

Q: Any parting remark?

A: I'm thankful to The Babishai Niwe Poetry Foundation for providing a platform that promotes literature in Africa. I'm honoured to be on this list alongside these wonderful poets.

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You may read the shortlisted poems here:
#BABISHAI2018 SHORTLIST

The #Babishai2018 poetry festival details are here:
#BABISHAI2018 POETRY FESTIVAL

ADEDAYO AGARAU: #BABISHAI2018 SHORTLIST

 “When he was 4, a lady kissed him & that was the very beginning.”

Adedayo Agarau is a Nigerian documentary photographer and poet. He explores the concept of godhood, boyhood, distance, and absence. His poems have been featured or forthcoming on Kalahari, Brittle Paper, Gaze Mag, Allegro, Obra Artifact, Praxis Magazine, African Writer, Click 042, One Jarcar Press, Expound Magazine, Geometry, 8poems and elsewhere.


Q:    What was the process of writing your particular poem, Stones?


A:  I have always cherished memories because they have directed my course through the years. Isn’t it beautiful that our body records events, even in our unconsciousness? Memory is like yellow tulips growing everywhere. No! not weeds, yellow tulips. Memories may come raging and turbulent, but when properly cared for, they are bliss. I was 9 when the Ikeja Cantonment bomb blast happened in 2002, with no hope of writing about it years to come. I wouldn’t even believe I would be a poet. I remember watching NTA NewsLine with my family, and there were pictures of a city full of dead people, covered with the white cloths, and some with the colours of the Nigerian flag, being mass buried.

Writing “Stones” was as heavy as the title. It just won’t let go. The poem was an old rag that needed to be rewashed. When the event happened in 2002, I was only 9 and clueless, never been anywhere near a fire. I am however glad I was able to revisit old memory and tuck it away.

Q:  What does poetry mean to you?

A: Poetry. WOW. Sincerely, some questions will never entirely get the answers they deserve. I started writing in 2013 because I had developed an interest in the beauty of rhymes. At that time, there
were revolutionary Facebook rap battles, and I wanted to take the shine on one of those days. But I found something higher than the vain brawl of words, which was being a commuter of memory. Gbenga Adesina, also a shortlisted poet of Babishai, in 2015, told me that this is the generation of writers that turns inward. Always trapped in memory, body, dream, self. I am trapped somewhere,
still. And each time I emerge, I come with testimonies of that victory or ruin. And these testimonies carefully display how dear and personal poetry is to me; the goings and comings, the asylum chapel, thoroughly documented by poetry.

Q:    What are your five year goals with your poetry?

A:   A lot would have gone under the shades by then, and at the same time, a lot would have emerged. By then, I believe I would be done with my first full-length collection of poems. While that is still in the works, I have it tucked in my breast pocket to study poetry. Most importantly, the urge to get better would carry me through these 5 years and beyond. So yes! In 5 years, I want to be strong, formidable and remain relentless.

Q: Which African poets are you keen on reading?

A: I was particularly waiting for this question. Yay! Hi Gbenga Adesina & DM Aderibigbe! Hello Safia Elhillo! I saturate my self with these people. Their writing has dramatically influenced my works. The glorious works of Romeo Oriogun, Rasaq Malik Gbolahan and Gbenga
Adeoba remain colourful in mind. Logan February's deep in line narratives keep me sleepless. I am very grateful for the gift of writing and the ability to read. Well, I have a blockchain of poets  that check and balance me in return, Mesioye John, Hauwa Nuhu, Nome Patrick, Wale Ayinla, Jide Badmus and Salawu Olajide (who is also on the shortlist), whose works have been my light for a long time now. I think reading poetry from other people helps us to understand their
core, and in return helps us to further understand our own cores too.

Q:  What are some of the challenges you face with poetry?

A: As much as I like to say that poetry is a profoundly personal engagement for me, I love to see how it influences my public space. I have experimented with my facebook page, and I realized that it seems we are living our readers behind as regards the revolution of African
Poetry. But I am grateful to the beautiful works paddling itself out throughout the continent. Soon! Soon! The light will find us all.

Q:  Is there anything of importance you would like to share with literature teachers, who are reading this?


A: Ah! Yes! Going by what Gbenga told me –“this is the generation
that turns inward.”

I think the body / self / the soul/ is a beautiful place. Full of chaos, fireflies crackling in fire; the body is a field with blessed of butterflies too. Writing curriculums should be drawn to address or
affect immediate environments. We, students, want to talk about our father, about our home, about how grandpa’s love has reshaped the family and a lot more. And we deserve to start writing about these things from now. In addition, the earth wants to hear our respective distinctive stories, and our skills should be crafted in that regard.

Q:    Any parting remark?

A: Poetry will someday rule the world, Babishai. We are the process.
Thank you Babishai!

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Read the other shortlisted poets here:
BABISHAI 2018 SHORTLIST

Our poetry festival is scheduled for 3-6 August at Sipi Falls in Kapchorwa, followed by Mbale. Join us, won't you? Call +256 751 703226

#BABISHAI2018 SHORTLIST: BOLUWATIFE AFOLABI

As we draw closer to the #Babishai2018 poetry festival, we will feature our #Babishai2018 shortlisted poets. Here below is Nigerian poet, Boluwatife Afolabi.

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Boluwatife Afolabi is the author of 'The Cartographer of Memory' an electronic poetry chapbook published by the Sankofa Initiative in September2017.

His works have appeared on Adda, Saraba Magazine, Arts and Africa, Expound Magazine, African Writers etc.

In June 2017, he was listed on nantygreens.com as one of the top 10 emerging Nigerian poets to be read.

He is also the poetry editor at agbowo.org. He lives and writes from Ibadan, Nigeria.

Twitter: @oluafolabi

Q:      What was the process of writing 'Because Everything Was Being Swallowed By Memory'

A: I have not been an alien to grief, neither have I been a kin to it but in 2017, I came close to understanding the true nature of loss and grief. My uncle's wife died. I called her Aunty Ebun. I thought I already knew what kindness was but she made kindness into something that could be seen and touched and felt. And it stayed with me.

When I heard that she died, my mind went white and my throat became dry. I wanted to cry but the tears didn't come running either. I did not know how to perform grief that was heavy inside my heart.

So, I mourned and attempted to remember her, the only way I have learned to remember things, by writing them down.

I waited for the poem. It was one of those poems that come in trickles but I was patient and the poem came.

It was my way of immortalizing her because I was afraid that time in its ruthlessness will soon turn my memory of her into a blur and I didn't want time and forgetfulness to take that memory away from me.

Q:     What does poetry mean to you?

A: While writing the introduction to my electronic chapbook, I spent days pondering on the true nature of my poetry, 'Why do I write?' and I came up with this-

'My poetry bears witness to the evolution of the human consciousness. To record, to heal, to serve as triggers of memory. Sometimes, it doesn't heal, and rereading words break me. But I'd rather become a sea of memory than to have existed without having written. The delight in the recognition of our shared humanity (in loss, in suffering, in love) is what spurs me. The desire to become a lens through which a shred of emotion can be viewed in full detail, absorbed, felt. There is nothing more glorious.'

Q: What are your five-year goals with poetry?

A: In the next five years, I hope to publish a full-length collection of poems. I want to explore the world more, have more soul-baring conversations with people from various cultures, write about them and treasure them in my poems.

Q: Which African poets are you keen on reading?

A: I started writing poetry in senior secondary school and my early influences were the great poets from the old generation like- Dennis Brutus, JP Clark, Niyi Osundare, Kofi Awoonor, and LS Senghor.

In recent years, I now favour contemporary African poets such as- Orimoloye Moyosore, Romeo Oriogun, Gbenga Adesina, Warsan Shire, Dami Ajayi, Logan February and Safia Elhillo.

Q: What are some of the challenges you face with poetry?

A: Writing in every form is very tasking and demands discipline and time. Sometimes I get carried away with my other reality and I am not able to write as much as I will like to.

Also, there are times when I am unable to connect with the image of the poem I want to write inside my head. At times like that, I like to think that the poem is not ready for me so I wait and let the poem come instead.

The most important lesson my poetry has been teaching me is patience. That I must not rush the process.

Q:  Is there anything of importance you would like to share with Literature teachers, who are reading this?

A: I will like to tell Literature teachers to approach teaching Literature from a more soulful perspective. What I mean is that the students of Literature should be made to understand all the various emotions that a poet has put into the poem.

They should ensure that they are not mechanical with the teaching of the subject. When students cannot connect with the soul of the poem they are reading, it makes learning Literature more cumbersome for them.

  Parting remarks.

I am very grateful to the Babishai Poetry Foundation for the opportunity they are giving emerging African poets to showcase their poems.

I will also like to say congratulations to all the other shortlisted poets and wish them good luck.

Thank you very much.

Read the rest of the #Babishai2018 shortlist here:
file:///C:/Users/user/Downloads/BABISHAI2018-SHORTLIST%20(1).pdf

REGISTER FOR OUR THREE BABISHAI 2017 POETRY FESTIVAL WORKSHOPS

We have three #Babishai2017 poetry festival workshops, that require registration by 31 July 2017. You will receive certificates afterwards.

Date: Saturday 5 August 2017
Time: 11:30am to 1:30pm
Trainer: Mbizo Chirasha, leading poet from Zimbabwe, conducting a poetry seminar for 19-29 year-olds. Entry is free
Venue: 32 Degrees East/Kansanga, opposite Bank of Baroda

Date: Sunday 6 August
Time: 11:30am to 1:30pm
Trainer: Mbizo Chirasha, leading poet from Zimbabwe, conducting a poetry seminar for 30 years and above
Venue: The Uganda Museum
Fee: 5,000/-


Date: Sunday 6 August
Time: 2:00pm to 4:00pm
Trainer: Kagayi Peter, Ugandan performer, published poet and trainer, conducting a poetry workshop for 16+
Venue: The Uganda Museum
Fee: Free entry



Register by sending a 100 word bio and photo to babishainiwe@babishainiwe.com by 31 July. You may attend more than one workshop.

THE #BABISHAI2016 POETRY FESTIVAL PROGRAMME IS HERE

Dear Friends,

The #Babishai2016 Poetry Festival programme is here. Follow the link below.

#Babishai2016 Poetry Festival Programme

Contact festival@babishainiwe.com
or  +256 751 703226 for any inquiry.