Tag Archives: Reflection

DRC No Comments

Mirna Kabwe is a 22 years old born in the DRC but based in Johannesburg South Africa. She is currently a third year student at the University of Monash studying computer sciences. She enjoys writing and listening to poetry. One of her poems was published in Sakaza Mngani (A Kidz Community Radio Handbook) in 2007.

Samkela Stamper

September 4, 2014

Samkela Stamper is a poet and community artist. She volunteers her time in programs that use the arts as a tool to impart social skills to children and youth from communities that need it the most.
She is a Nelspruit, White River based author of the self-published memoir, Not for All the Apples, Peanut Butter & Jam. Samkela first read her memoir at the Edinburgh International Book Festival in Scotland in 2012. This led to an invitation to launch the book at the 2012 edition of the Open Book Festival in Cape Town. Samkela is an official participant of the Edinburgh World Writer’s Conference 2012/ 2013.

More recently, Samkela re-launched her book upon invitation by the NELM (The National English Literal Museum) as part of the National Arts Festival Grahamstown.

Samkela is currently a features writer for Lowveld Living Magazine. She is also an MC and the founder of the Single Hand Project and is on a mission to sell five million copies of her book.

Keith Oleng

September 4, 2014

Keith Oleng also known as K.O.K.O is a 29 year old poet, performer and creative director from Kenya.

His journey into the arts started when he was in the theatre arts club at Kakamega High School, where he learned about theatre directing, acting and creative writing. He then went on to study mass communication and film arts in Cetral TAFE College [Australia] and New York Film Academy [USA].

Later he started a communication organization called Oleng Communication, which focuses on understanding and communicating the interests of young people in Africa.

His first poetry collection, titled LOVE, Taken to a Mysterious Place is available for free download on his artist website.

Titilope

August 28, 2014

Nigeria No Comments

When Titilope first stepped to the microphone in 2007 at a local open mic, to gracing stages from Lagos to Cape Town, New York to California, Edmonton to Toronto and places in between, her goal has been to remind people that the ties that bind us transcend all of the borders we have created. She will tell you that no poem is brand new. In the telling and re-telling we are reminded that someone has walked this path before.

Titilope is a Nigerian born civil engineer, author and spoken word poet and the winner of the 2011 Canadian Authors’ Association Emerging Author Award for her first collection of poems, Down To Earth. In 2013 Titilope released her first spoken word album Mother Tongue and her second collection of poetry, Abscess, in 2014 with Geko Publishing in South Africa.

She was a resident artist at the 2011 Yemoya Artist Residency under the mentorship of acclaimed Jamaican-Canadian Dub poet and educator, D’bi Young. She was the recipient of the 2013 RISE award for achievement in the arts and the 2014 National Black Coalition of Canada Fil Fraser Award.

She has featured on stages across Canada and internationally, performing with Sonia Sanchez, Jayne Cortez, Yusef Komunyakaa, Obiora Odechukwu, Bassey Ikpi, Twin Poets and Offiong Bassey, at the 2011 Achebe Colloquium on Africa at Brown University. In 2013, Titilope was selected from over 200 writers to meet legendary poet and author, Dr. Maya Angelou.

She is the creator of Rouge Poetry, a weekly open mic that has feature local and international poets and musicians for over 5 years. She is the founding member of the Breath In Poetry Collective, home of the 2011 Canadian Festival of Spoken Word (CFSW) championship winning Edmonton Slam Team. Titilope also adds acting to her list of accomplishments, starring as Eki in the Ndani TV hit series, Gidi Up that will air across Africa in 2014.

Even with the soil of continents beneath her feet, the stories that are surer with each passing year, she has not forgotten where it all began. She will tell you it is simple; when your heart is cracked open and a multitude of words begin to leak from your chest, before you stain everything you dare to touch, put it in a poem.

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Mxolisi Nyezwa

August 28, 2014

Mxolisi Nyezwa was born in 1967 in New Brighton, Port Elizabeth. He runs a public-phones business from a steel container in Motherwell township. Mxolisi is the founder editor of the cultural magazine Kotaz, now in its 15th year. He has published three collections of poetry, Song Trials (2000), New Country (2008), and Malikhanye (2011). Mxolisi still lives in New Brighton township, close to where he was born at 4 Madala Street.

Bilkis Moola

Bilkis Moola is an Educator who works as a Head of Department in Languages at a school in Vukuzakhe, a township located in Volksrust, Mpumalanga province, South Africa. Her first anthology of poetry Wounds & Wings evolved as an introspective quest for recovery from her personal narrative of an abusive relationship. Bilkis presently divides her time between professional responsibilities and post-graduate studies in Education.

Beverley Nambozo Nsengiyunva

Uganda No Comments

Beverley Nambozo Nsengiyunva is the founder of Beverley Nambozo Poetry Award and Babishai Niwe Literary Foundation which means Creating with You, in a mixture languages. It Babishai Niwe has been coordinating annual poetry awards for Ugandan women since 2008 targeting hundreds of women country-wide over the past 5 years, being the only award o its kind in the country. In 2014, the award will extend to the entire continent, targeting both men and women. In 2013, the foundation will publish an anthology of poetry from poets of Africa. Beverley Nambozo is also the author of Unjumping, a chapbook collection of poetry which was published by erbacce-press in 2010 after she emerged a joint first runner-up in their annual poetry competition. She has a Masters Degree from Lancaster University and devotes a lot of time to being a stay-at-home mum. Beverley currently lives in Kampala and looks forward to travelling far corners of the world with her husband and children.

Beverly Rycroft

Beverly Rycroft’s debut poetry collection, Missing, recently won the Ingrid Jonker Award. In 2011 she was awarded second prize in the EU Sol Plaatje Poetry Competition for her poem Has your Dad got a Bird yet? In 2000 she was joint winner of the Femina/Sensa Features Competition.

Beverly is a graduate of UCT and Wits. A qualified teacher, she has written for both local and international magazines. Her poems have appeared in Carapace, New Coin, scrutiny2, New Contrast and the anthology Difficult to Explain. She has performed readings of her work in Cape Town, Hermanus, The Franschoek Literary Festival, East London and Johannesburg, many of them with the poet Finuala Dowling. She is currently setting up the poetry section of the 2013 Franschoek Literary Festival with Dr Dowling. Beverly lives in Cape Town with her family.

Billene “Bilu” Seyoum

Ethiopia No Comments

Billene “Bilu” Seyoum – avid word lover and travel enthusiast has been splashing words to paper since the age of twelve capturing her experiences of faces, places and spaces. Her poetry aims to take listeners and readers on a journey of re-imagining different imaginings of everyday existence. Having lived in five countries and traveled wide, Bilu’s poetry embraces her global identity.

Bulelwa Basse

Bulelwa Basse is the Founder of Lyrical Base Project, an arts and culture organisation which seeks to elevate the profiles of writers from marginalised communities through community-publishing projects and performance poetry (merged with music, dance, visual arts) at cultural and corporate events.

She has collaborated nationally with various arts education institutions and literary establishments, such as Kgare Ya Africa, Centre for the Book, Iziko Museum’s Education Department, Cape Town Language Committee, Artscape Theatre, Badilisha Poetry and the City of Cape Town, in the capacity of Language Facilitator, Published/Performance Poet, Guest Speaker and Events Co-ordinator.

Her writing has been published by the Poetry Institute of Africa, University of KwaZulu Natal Press, Department of Arts and Culture, The British Council and Oprah Magazine.

Basse is passionate about aligning herself with women empowerment projects such as Bona Magazine’s Women Empowerment Club, True Love Magazine’s Winning Style and Move Magazine’s empowerment initiatives, for which she’s both hosted and performed her poetry as a motivational tool.

Bulelwa is former Editor of Muse, an online poetry publishing and profiling magazine, and has earned herself a performance platform on, Poetry Delight, where she’s affectionately known on stage as, Miss “Sassy” Basse, following her satirical poem entitled: My Lyrical Sass, which confronts the societal nature of portraying women as sex-objects.

Her creative and business path has seen her represent her country as an arts and cultural-exchange ambassador in India (Coimbatore and Kerala) and tour the UK (England). But South African stages have always been her favorite arena of her work at play.

Bassey Ikpi

United States No Comments

Bassey Ikpi is a Nigerian born poet/writer who was a featured cast member of the National Touring Company of the Tony Award winning Broadway show, Russell Simmon’s Def Poetry Jam. Not a stranger to the stage, her poetry has also opened shows by Grammy Award winning artists. Recently, Bassey appeared on the NAACP Image Awards as part of a tribute to Venus and Serena Williams and was a featured performer for Johannesburg, South Africa’s annual arts festival, Joburg Arts Alive. Bassey has been seen gracing the pages of magazines such as Nylon, Marie Claire, Glamour and Bust.

With social commentary being a focus of her work, Bassey recorded an original poem for the Kaiser Foundation’s, HIV/AIDS campaign, Knowing Is Beautiful. Bassey’s personal and heartfelt work has made her a much sought after performer. She is currently working on various screenplays as well as freelance writing for social media outlets. Her first completed collection of poetry and prose entitled, Blame My Teflon Heart: Poetry, Prose and Post-Its For Boys Who Didn’t Write Back will be released soon. In addition to her writing, this summer Bassey is also embarking on a 5 city tour, appropriately called “Basseyworld Live”, where each show will infuse poetry and interactive panel discussions on everything from politics to pop culture. Not only will she headline each show, but will also moderate the panel discussions, which will include special invited guests from various industries such as art, film and journalism.

Blaq Pearl

Blaq Pearl has performed with her band at Jazzathon and various city concerts particularly in Mitchell’s Plain. Having featured on television program Hectic 9nine and Keeping it Real, she is working on releasing unique designed T-shirt merchandise on www.sabandmerchandise.com. Currently Blaq Pearl is in the studio completing her album to be released this year.

She aspires to contribute to positive change in South Africa’s current state regarding the music industry and youth empowerment. To be successful and inspire upcoming artists & musicians and to to grow immensely and continuously in her musical talents and self.

Her poetry and music entails social content, controversial /tabooed issues and is about empowerment and real experiences + strength and motivation. She describes her music genre as a fusion of African/ Soul / Jazz / Hip Hop/ R&B.

Breyten Breytenbach

The work of Breyten Breytenbach includes numerous volumes of poetry, novels, and essays, many of which are in Afrikaans, many translated from Afrikaans to English, and many published originally in English. In 2000, Breytenbach published Lady One: Of Love and Other Poems, a collection of poems for his wife that includes images of east Asia, southern Africa, and Morocco. The combination of the personal and the global in the poems reflects a marriage that, because it was considered taboo under South African apartheid laws, led to the poet’s original exile.

Known as the finest living poet of the Afrikaans language, Professor Breytenbach’s verse volumes include The Iron Cow Must Sweat (1964) and Footscript (1976) and they feature rich visuals, a powerful use of metaphor, and a complex blending of references from Buddhism, Afrikaans idiomatic speech, and recollections of the South African landscape. He has been honored with numerous literary and art awards, including the APB Prize, CAN Award (five times) Allan Paton Award for Literature, Rapport Prize, Hertzog Prize, Reina Prinsen-Geerling Prize, Van der Hoogt Prize, Jan Campert Award and Jacobus van Looy Prize for Literature and Art.

Barbra Breeze Anderson

August 25, 2014

Zimbabwe No Comments

Barbra Breeze Anderson is a performance poet, writer and designer. She started the art of performing in the year 2007 at the ‘Power In The Voice Competition’, a British Council sponsored event where she performed a short prose piece.

Barbra breeze the performance poet was born a year and seven months ago at the Book Cafe and since then has been exposed to frequent poetry slams such as the House of Hunger poetry slam at the Book Café. She has performed at Open Mic events and other poetry events at the Book Café/ Mannenberg such as Sistaz Open Mic and Mashoko events.

Barbra also took her poetry outside of the two venues to places such as Alliance France’s Chimoto poetry night and an Acoustic Night at the Symphony. She has performed at the Buddyz Annual Festival of the Arts (BAFA) 2009 at Harare Gardens and the Sixteen Days of Activism concert 2010. Barbra performed in Bulawayo in 2010, she has appeared on television and radio –Youth.com, Spot Fm’s various spoken word outlets and has featured in Newspaper articles from Newsday, the Daily News, Herald, the online regional news site Shout Africa and the online outlet Zimbo Jam. The articles have been profiles of her and her current projects.

Early this year she performed at a community based event ‘Step Up’ 2011 at the Aquatic Sports club in Chitungwiza and at the monthly ongoing Mashoko event at the Mannenberg. She performed at the U.S Embassy Black History Event 2011 at the Ambassadors House in early February. Barbra is now working on various projects, one that she has put into effect is a monthly Poetry night event called ‘Poetry And’ launched in April 2011 where poetry is fused with different genres of art. She is working with some of the best of Zimbabwe’s spoken word artists and she intends to make it a success.

Barbra has participated at the first edition of Shoko Spoken Word and Hip Hop Festival 2011 and she has performed her poetry at a Pamberi trust project-a Concert for Non Violence 2011, in Highfield, in September this year and at the Acoustic Night, November 2011 edition.

For the year 2012, she opened it as part of the poets of the spoken word section at Harare International Festival of the Arts (Hifa), 1-6 May edition, where she hosted and performed at the Hivos Poetry Café.

Muhammad Muwakil

Trinidad and Tobago No Comments

Muhammad Muwakil is currently enrolled at the University of the West Indies pursuing a degree in English Literature with a minor in International Relations. He has been performing spoken word poetry in Trinidad for the past five years, and is heavily involved in the spoken word poetry movement in Trinidad and by extension the Caribbean region.

In 2007 he performed at the Calabash Literary Festival in Jamaica, and in 2009 his work was published in the Casa de Las Americas annual review. Muhammad is also an actor and has been involved in several major productions. In 2008 he won the Cacique Award (the highest award for acting in Trinidad) for best supporting actor, for his role in the production entitled Bitter Cassava.

He believes his work is an essential ingredient in the struggle of the African Diaspora in reconnecting with itself and the continent. It is one of his main goals to use this work to make people more aware of their past, their present situation and what we need to do to secure our collective future.

Moses Serubiri

Uganda No Comments

Born in 1989, Moses Serubiri took to writing poems while in high school, for the AIDS Club. His poems and prose were first published in the Kibuli Secondary School Magazine in 2005. More recently his poem I Remember was selected for the Hay Poetry Festival’s Shortlist. He is a poet, photographer and pianist currently living in Kampala, Uganda.

Megan Hall

Currently Publishing Manager at Oxford University Press, Megan Hall has also edited poems and short stories for New Contrast. Her poetry was extensively published in numerous journals, before she launched her debut collection Fourth Child. The work received widespread acclaim, winning the 2008 Ingrid Jonker Prize for a debut collection. Her poems have been described as “moving and cathartic”, exploring emotions of despair, loss, love, resolution and healing.

Mbali Kgosidintsi

Mbali Kgosidintsi graduated from the University of Cape Town in 2004 with a B.A in Theatre and Performance and was on the Deans Merit List for Drama. Her professional debut was on the Maynardville stage where she played the young lead of Hero in
Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, directed by Fred Abrehemse.

She then went on to do Tall Horse with The Handspring Puppet Company, which opened at The Baxter Theatre in Cape Town 2005, before touring to the Theatre de Welt Festival in Stuttgart Germany, followed by an eight state American tour at various prestigious venues, from the Brooklyn Academy of Music in New York to The Kennedy Centre in Washington DC.

In the same year, she joined The Mother Tongue Project who collaborated with members of the Darling community to workshop and produce Breathing Space for the Darling Festival. On her return from Darling she staged her first production, By word of Mouth- A night of Lace and Petals which combines dance, music, poetry and theatrical aspects to tell a story featuring Rite 2 Speak. She is one of the members of Rite 2 Speak, a female poetry collective that addresses identity in contemporary South Africa. They have performed at prestigious events ranging from National Women’s Day 2008 to Heritage Day in Portugal and Urban Voices Festival 2009.

Mbali played the lead of Electra in Yael Farber’s Molora which opened in Yokohama, Japan 2006. She was recruited as one of four writers / adapters to develop two productions for the London/South Africa based company Portobello productions. The writing team, directed by Mark Donford-May, adapted A Magic Flute – Impempe Yomlingo and it went on to win the 2008 Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Musical Revival.

Mbali was awarded a writing residency on the island of Sylt, Germany to develop her autobiographical novel, which formed the basis for her one-woman show, which was then produced by The Mother Tongue Project entitled Tseleng The Baggage of Bags written and performed by Mbali and directed by Sara Matchett. It won the ovation award at The National Grahamstown festival 2010. Mbali was invited to participate in Poetry workshops hosted by Badilisha Poetry X-change featuring internationally acclaimed poets and selected to participate in a two-week workshop with internationally acclaimed poet, Stacey Ann Chin where they investigated themes of the self and the body.

She recently played the character of a modern day Medea in award winning playwright and human rights activist, Ariel Dorfman’s Purgatorio, at a play reading hosted by the Baxter Theatre.

Mbali continues to write and perform poetry and is working on her first novel.

Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye

Marjorie Oludhe Macgoye is one of the most prolific women writers, not only in Kenya, but also in Africa. She has distinguished herself as a writer of novels, poetry, and children’s stories. She was born in Southampton, England, in 1928 and came to Kenya as a missionary bookseller in 1954. She married D.G.W. Macgoye in 1960 and subsequently integrated into her husband’s extended family and the Luo community. This feature is well manifested in her literary works which have been acknowledged all over the world. Coming to Birth won the Sinclair Prize for fiction in 1986, while Homing In won second place in the Jomo Kenyatta Prize for Literature in 1985.

Marce Underwood

Marce is a poet and classically trained singer from Cape Town, South Africa. Some of her poetry has been published in Sugar and Spice, a South African Anthology. She is aslo a member of a trio called Project Escape, which fuses poetry and music.

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Malibongwe Omega Snyman

Malibongwe Omega Snyman, also known as “The Lazzy Poet” was born and raised in Eastern Cape, South Africa. He has performed his “street poetry” on various platforms.

Lazzy Poet’s latest brainchild and achievement has been his collaboration with, LoveLife, an NGO that deals with HIV, teenage pregnancy and various other social issues.

He is also the founder of Poetic Expressionz, a platform established to showcase the artistic work of the youth in his home town.

Mzi Mahola

Mzi Mahola was born in 1949 as Mzikayise Winston Mahola. Mzi Mahola is his nom de plume. He started writing while he was at school. The Special Branch confiscated his first poetry manuscript in 1976 (That year, South African students rebelled against the government, which cracked down without restraint. Read more about the 1976 Soweto Uprising. Ed.) and he lost interest in writing for twelve years. After this period he started writing again, submitting work successfully to national and international journals, magazines and publications. His work has been published in more than eight anthologies.

His first book with poems is titled Strange Things and was published in 1994 by Snail Press. This volume received positive reviewing and was amongst those to represent South Africa in Geneva in a World Book fare in 1995. There was interest in translating the book into German and Danish, but this has not materialised to date.

His second volume When Rain Comes was published in 2000 by Carapace and won the Olive Schreiner Book prize.

At the moment he is editing and finalizing a semi-biographical novel called The Broken Link.

He has presented papers and given speeches at the National Arts Festival and at other venues for school children. He gives poetry readings for University groups and community projects. Now and then he runs poetry workshops for interested groups of writers.

Mufasa

Mufasa is a spoken word artist, actor and singer born and raised in Kenya. He popped into the spoken word scene after winning a spoken word slam competition. Since then Mufasa has been performing in all major poetry events in Kenya. Raised by a single mother, Mufasa is a passionate performer on stage and hides no emotions when he speaks about his life and disturbing issues in the society.

Mbali Vilakazi

Mbali Vilakazi is a child of the city by the sea, who came into being under the watchful eye of a silent mountain. She is born on the 9th day of the 9th sign. The Archer.

She is Nona’s daughter, Mzamo’s sister and Avumiles aunt. A woman who holds the gaze and the spectator in her own life.

Tracing her beginnings as a patient journey into herself, she holds the dream of a youth that rises to assume both its relevance and place. Touched by the wisdom in children, she remembers that it is always the little things.

Soul Activist, Poet, Flower. She is a Fairy. And the Queen in exile. With pen as sceptre and her throne a cloud. On a mission to answer the call.

She hears voices, sees in the dark and when she gows up, she wants to be Sade.

Marí Peté

Durban poet Marí Peté writes in Afrikaans and English. Marí was born and schooled in the Mpumalanga province in South Africa.

Marí wrote her Street Poems Collection while driving to and from various campuses of the Durban University of Technology where she has worked as an e-Learning specialist for almost twenty years. During Poetry Africa 2010, the Mail and Guardian described Marí’s performance of the poem Durban Taxi (a conglomeration of taxi names) as “a delicious success”. The poem Warwick Junction was shortlisted for the Sol Plaatje European Union Poetry Award in 2012.

Various tensions and juxtapositions arise from Marí’s Cambridge Poetry Collection, which could be ascribed to the fact that the poems were originally written in Afrikaans, during the year before South Africa’s first democratic elections. Halfronde / north and south was written upon receiving the news of the death of Chris Hani.

Marí has published two bilingual poetry collections namely Amytis (2007) and Begin (2002). With Bianca Bothma, Marí was editor of Art for Humanity’s book Women Artists and Poets Advocate Children’s Rights.

Malika Lueen Ndlovu

Malika Lueen Ndlovu is a poet, playwright, performer, arts project manager and mother of three sons, with a wide range of experience in the Arts and Arts Management arena.

Malika is a founder-member of Cape Town-based women writers’ collective WEAVE, co-editor of their multi-genre anthology WEAVE’s Ink @ Boiling Point: A selection of 21st Century Black Women’s writing from the Southern Tip of Africa. In 2004 she initiated the And The Word Was Woman Ensemble of female performance poets and later that year joined The Mothertongue Project, a women performing artists, writers and visual artists collective.

Malika has four of her own poetry collections, besides her work being featured in several local and international publications, namely Born in Africa But , Womb to World: A Labour of Love, Truth is both Spirit and Flesh and Invisible Earthquake: a Woman’s Journal through Stillbirth a poetic memoir published by new South African Women’s press, Modjaji Books.

Her published plays include the award-winning drama A Coloured Place and most recently Sister Breyani.

In 2007 she co-curated The Africa Centre’s 5-day international poetry festival and is currently a presenter for BadilishaPoetry.com, an online poetry radio station podcasting Pan-African poets.

As an independent artist Malika operates under the brand New Moon Ventures, which is dedicated to creating indigenous, multi-media and collaborative works in line with her personal motto “healing through creativity.”

Nina Femme

Nina Femme is a poet-feminist who is trying to master writing, protesting and finding balance in the pursuit of love and justice. Flowers and Feminism, a personally inspired poem, earned her second place in the national Drama for Life Lover and Another poetry competition in 2013. “I wrote my first piece ten years ago, but it never gets easier because the issues never get easier.” When she isn’t in an existential state, she contests her title as “the worst pool player in the Westrand”.

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Ngoma Hill

United States No Comments

Ngoma is a performance poet, multi-instrumentalist, singer/songwriter and paradigm shifter, residing in Harlem, New York. For over 40 years, he has used culture as a tool to raise sociopolitical and spiritual consciousness through work that encourages critical thought.

His poetry has been widely published including in African Voices Magazine, Long Shot Anthology, The Underwood Review, Signifyin’ Harlem Review, Bum Rush The Page/Def Poetry Jam Anthology and Poems On The Road To Peace (Volumes 1,2&3) Yale Press. He was featured in the PBS Spoken Word Documentary, The Apro-Poets with Allen Ginsberg.

Ngoma has also hosted the slam at the Dr. Martin Luther King Festival of Social and Environmental Justice Festival (Yale University-New Haven, CT) for the past 14 years. His CD Reflections (1964-2006) pays tribute to some of the activist and cultural workers whose shining example served as a beacon for his work as an artist.

His latest C.D. State of Emergency (The Essential Ngoma) is available on CDBaby.com and iTunes.com.

Nduta Kariuki

Nduta Kariuki is an artist working and studying in Nairobi, Kenya. She paints primarily, in a personal style that is derived from pop art, but dabbles extensively and has working knowledge of most art forms.

Nduta is currently a fourth year Fine Arts student at Kenyatta University. She is a freelance artist and has worked with Samsung and various high schools for the annual Music and Drama festivals. She enjoys writing, as it allows her to express her quirky sense of humor, and has performed at the Slam Africa, Word Up Live, St. Andrew’s Eve of Poetry and Wamathai events.

Her work has been shown in the following venues: The Michael Joseph Centre, Kenya Railways Museum Gallery, the National Museum, Paa ya Paa Gallery, The Kenyatta University’s Culture and Career weeks, International School of Kenya.

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Native Son