Poetry & Spoken Word

Across the borders of mental rage,
Our eyes open to a new life like a flower
On a gentle summer morning
And fear becomes only a state of mind.

When memory brings back to us,
Our own words of wisdom lost,
Only then shall we read sorrows Written in our history's eyes.
To see that glory lies beyond our fears Beneath our courage.

By Dr. Ejine Okoroafor-Ezediaro

Just like mud lying in wait
Post torrential downpour
Waiting for whom to trip
You wait, lurking at corners
Your mosquito harbingers hovering
With proboscis ready to pierce
And inject a venomous malaria dose

By Tamunobarabi Gogo Ibulubo

each time we walk
each time we swim
each time we sit down

at the sea side

By Tamunobarabi Gogo Ibulubo

misty and misty sky
a wavy cloudy movement
of water and of water
sharing the colour to black
mixed into a rainbow arc

Zwelithini Simela was born in May 1983 in Bulawayo, Zimbabwe's second city. From an early age he took an active interest in poetry, including performances at school shows. His later and more profound literary influences were Dan Fluani ("God's Case: No Appeal"); Zimbabwean writer and poet Dambudzo Marechera; William Shakespeare; Thomas Hardy and the well known Chinua Achebe. Zwelithini is now a student at the International University Bremen, Germany studying for a Bachelor's in Integrated Social Sciences. His keen interests are African political history, and Development Economics and Diasporic Studies.

Yusuf M. Adamu lectures in the department of Geography, Bayero University, Kano, Nigeria. Currently with the School of Public Health, University of Alabama Birmingham as a Fulbright visiting researcher. He got his first degree in Geography from the Usmanu Danfodiyo University Sokoto, Nigeria and his Masters degree in the same discipline from the University of Ibadan. Currently a Ph.D. candidate at the Bayero University Kano working on maternal mortality in Kano State.