Poetry

“There is something exciting about encountering in these poets not a rejection of the past, but a genuine engagement with it. And this engagement is predicated on a desire to make sense of the present. The past is fraught with contradictory impulses, and yet it offers the possibility of meaning. In many ways, these collections should be a reassuring, even if at the time unsettling, gift for the older poets who are concerned that the contemporary poet is not engaged by the past — not engaged by the traditions of the past, if you will. What these poets demonstrate is a persistent sense that they have been shaped by their pasts, but they engage the past in the manner of the lyric itself.” — Kwame Dawes, from the box set introduction

“Here is a poet whose practised weaving of talk and song is a testament to her devotion to language and her clarity of vision. Those of us who have encounted Diaka with excitement invite you to listen to us as she offers us a new song, one which will surely not be her last.” — Tjawangwa Dema, from the preface