PRESS RELEASE: ADEEKO IBUKUN FROM
NIGERIA TAKES THE #BABISHAI2015 POETRY PRIZE
On Friday 28 August, at the
close of the three day first ever poetry festival in Uganda, Professor Remi
Raji, Babishai Poetry board member and President of Association of Nigerian
Authors, announces Adeeko Ibukun from Nigeria,
the overall winner of the #Babishai2015 Poetry prize. From over 2,000 poems, the judges, Professor
Antjie Prog, Mildred Barya and Richard Ali, selected a long-list of 45 and then
a shortlist of 15, whose poems can be read here. http://www.bnpoetryaward.co.ug/download/bnpa_2015_shortlist.pdf.
Adeeko Ibukun won
for his poem, A Room With A Drowning Book, which the judges agreed unanimously,
was befitting. Professor Antjie Grog says of the winning poem,
“The winning poem is a good
example of a very sophisticated way of presenting
content: the choice of a two line
stanza creates a sense of simplicity, this is strengthened by the use of a
sesure (a kind of pause due to the comma or fullstop in the middle of a line)
creating a calm atmosphere.”
In second place was Sheila Okongo
Omare Nyanduaki from Kenya, for her poem, The Ghost of Jevanjee and in third
place was Nick Makoha from Uganda, for his poem, LHR. In 4th place
was Famia Nkansa from Ghana for her poem, Elixir and in 5th was
Arinze Ifeakandu for his poem, Like Scented Mangoes.
The overall winner receives 1,000
USD and the top five will receive autographed copies of anthologies and
collections namely A Thousand Voices Rising, Boda Boda Anthem and Other Poems,
A Nation in Labour by Harriet Anena and copies of Professor Raji’s poetry
collections. All the fifteen shortlisted poets will participate in poetry
mentorship programs beginning the end of 2015. They will each attend poetry and
literary festivals around the continent too.
The #Babishai2016 Poetry festival
takes place from 24 to 26 August at The Uganda Museum and from June 10 to 13 in
2016, we’ll be experiencing a Babishai Poetry On the Mountains of The Moon in
Kasese, Uganda. Next year’s call for poetry submissions will begin in January
2016.
You may read the winning poem
here:
A
ROOM WITH A DROWNING BOOK by Adeeko
Ibukun (Nigeria)
Somewhere
in the room a book is drowning, the floor
is
shivering with pages. You said the spine is the balance
to
our two winged hearts. Sometimes it’s the light knitting
its
letters to our hearts. I see how things hold us in their lights
so
we aren’t here or there like you’re here and somewhere
a
lover holds you in her heart, light in water teaching these lessons.
Sometimes
something holds clearly what we couldn’t say in words.
We
face it to learn our silence and that again becomes part of
our
languages. Places own us like this, light bounces off them,
turning
their spears at me. Our hearts beat now and vision takes
its
shapes—the stream of consciousness, nuances as water turn,
streamlet
as novella lost in our undercurrent. I’m
lost in a story now
or
a story’s lost in me. Perhaps we should hang on words so that
we
do not drown. Remembering makes living its anchor. So I asked
if
it’s us you wanted to save insisting everything
is placed this way
and
that way of our anniversaries, each moment
achieved as light
buried
in water—so it’s here or there, past or present, our chairs and tables,
dresser
and records becoming the dykes. The mirror’s at an angle
to
the world so it does not yield all its light at once. Everything’s our
subject
before we become their subject, relying on memories to endure.
Sincerely,
The Babishai Poetry Team.
Tel: +256 751 703226
Twitter: @BNPoetryAward
