Welcome to Konya Shamsrumi, the capital of African poetry.

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Poets Talk: 5 Questions with John Chinaka Onyeche

I am that song you nod and hum to but still can’t sing along with, because, sometimes, it’s too deep. Yet, it flows, attracting passersby who know nothing of the sadness within. ...

Poets Talk: 5 Questions with Kayeon Onyeka

Poets Talk: 5 Questions with Jakky Bankong-Obi

Poets Talk: 5 Questions with Odu Ode

Three Poems by Star Zahra || The Bala Selection

Three Poems by Tade Ipadeola || The Bala Selection

Three Poems by Sumaila Umasiha || The Bala Selection

I would go on to discover that the opportunity to read poems in Morocco liberated the silenced voice within me: the empathic pain I had carried in my body, shaped by the violence of the world, by barbarity that tears away people's dignity and lives.

Reading Bewitchment in Nasiba Babale’s Pickled Moments

Seen through the symbolic lens of alchemy, Babale’s self-fashioning as “Poet of Light” works out a transmutation of value: what history has rendered base or obscured—blackness, the self denied—is worked upon until it gleams with renewed worth. Like the alchemist who turns lead into gold, she converts silence into speech and stigma into power, not through softness but through a revelatory force that disturbs settled orders. Her illumination is thus a form of spiritual alchemy—witchcraft as transformation—where revelation does not merely disclose truth but remakes the terms by which beauty and being are known.

Poetic Cloud – #Andrea

Being on a cloud, once in a while, is the poet’s strategy for finding inner peace in a world in a rush and stressed—a sensation visitors may experience through the installation's sensory experience.

In The Poetry of Life | Nasiba Babale

That being said. What on God’s green earth is wrong with you? I do not understand you at all! You have caused me a lot of trouble, embarrassed me, put me in situations where only the Grace of God saved me, and made me look stupid in places where I was supposed to maintain my steeze. And if you cared to know anything about me, you would know that I take my steeze seriously.

Black Poets

Black Poets: Ikeogu Oke.

Ikeogu Oke was a Nigerian poet and journalist who died in Abuja on November 27th, 2018, at 51. He hailed from Ohafia in south-eastern Nigeria and was considered a deeply spiritual person. He sought to embody traditional African beliefs, notably wearing the Ohafia war dress to high-profile events to highlight his Igbo heritage.

Black Poets: Warsan Shire.

Black Poets: Véronique Tadjo.

Black Poets: Bassey Ikpi.

This is Why We Colour – #Luqman

To colour is to accept that there are limits and bounds, that freedom is the deep end of a shallow pond and drowning is not a choice. That our liberties are normative and must issue from the collective fiat of convention, the healthy custom of the many against the wily tempest of the one. Liberty then is a prison of accepted conduct, a glazed casket waiting for us to die.

The True Face Of Rain – #Andrea

Both parents attended their son’s performance at Solothurner Literaturtage (Literature Festival 15-17 Mai 2025) and his father said proudly: “We have created him”. Jonathan grew up in Switzerland. He mentions that it is a place that allows him to face the past, not as a burden, but as chance, that allows him to use words (prose, poems, spoken word and Rap) to resist, to forget and to nourish hope.

In The Poetry of Life: Seven Reasons Why I Don’t Let My Mother Read My Poems | Nasiba Babale

No one wants a gathering of aunts. They will sit in a semi-circle, with me before them: head low and my shame a halo above my head. They will pass my poem from one bewildered hand to another. It will be a love poem. They will shake their heads; make a valley out of their mouths, clap their hands, and let out both audible and inaudible sighs. They will look at me with eyes carrying both disappointment and wonder. They will wonder how I am able to write all these things. Wonder how I even know these things exist, the child that I am. They will try to reconcile their sweet daughter with the stranger on the page. Then they will ask for the identity of the one who has taken my heart..

In The Poetry of Life: The Poetic Side of Melancholy | Nasiba Babale

It isn’t that I have never written a poem in the absence of melancholy. I have. But there is a way melancholy pokes into your soul; it makes you feel things; it lifts the curtain over your eyes and makes you see the world with vivid alacrity. There is a way it sequestrates the feelings out of you and turns them into words. There is a way melancholy does these that joy simply doesn’t know how to. Melancholy is poetry’s favorite child.

Sisi Akoko Magazine

Chinua Achebe Appears In Gen Z Style, Declares A New Version Of Vulture— Selfishness Bruh

From Rappers And Poets, Umar Farouk Adeiza Reveals His Relationship With Words.

Kindergarten Maths Is Hard Says Nigerian Poet, Ayobami Kayode.

…To Write Memories That Tears You Apart After Haruki Murakami.

From The Editor

Konya Shamsrumi Publishes Tanure Ojaide’s Adult Love

Konya Shamsrumi Publishes Tanure Ojaide’s Adult Love ...

[News Alert] Garba Dakaskus Sighted at Roving Heights Bookstore, Abuja

BIRTHING WORDS: Will you buy my words… or An Author’s Short Introspection on His Writing Odyssey – Tope Ogundare

Café 24

Cafe 24 || Winner: Lost And Found By Stephen Olayemi.

Cafe 24 || Winner: Future Plans by Akumbu Uche

Cafe 24: Call For Submissions.

Cafe 24 || Winner: I Am North By Shehu Mubarak Sulaiman

In The Poetry of Life by Naseeba Babale

In The Poetry of Life: Things I Remember About My Grandmother | Nasiba Babale

I remember my grandmother by a lot of things, and when I picture myself in old age, I see myself in her image. Tall, lean, with a slightly curved back, a head full of gray hair that tangles and covers my eyes when being loose. Rheumy eyes set on a dark lean face, hands that are ever generous, and a serious demeanor that resets naughty grandchildren back to their default setting.

In The Poetry of Life: The What-Ifs | Nasiba Babale

In The Poetry of Life: The Last Stanza | Nasiba Babale

In The Poetry of Life: Dear Friday | Nasiba Babale

Star Zahra Quartet

1 .

A Poem is a Clan of Things || Star Zahra

2 .

Write of the Thing with Feathers || Star Zahra

3 .

Tanzania || Star Zahra

4 .

Vial of Immortality || Star Zahra

Star Zahra Quartet

Everything Here

Complex Metaphors and Naming: Saddiq Dzukogi and Star Zahra

Complex Metaphors and Naming features poet and Mississippi State University professor Saddiq Dzukogi in conversation with poet and fabric designer Star Zahra, whose sophomore collection, Girls and the Silhouette of Form, won the 2025 Association of Nigerian Authors/KMVL Prize for Poetry. Dzukogi was also a finalist for the ANA Prize for Poetry in 2012, 2014, and 2016. The interview was recorded in March 2025.