Letting the Kora Hold the Poem by Octavia McBride-Ahebee

 

My literary work is shaped by the convergence of cultures and the many ways people move across the world be it by choice, by necessity, or by force. I write toward intimate relationships and everyday lives, even as they unfold within broader systems of global inequality. Aging, memory, and care sit at the center of this work, revealing how history quietly lives in the body and in shared spaces.

I’m deeply influenced by the West African tradition of the griot as represented by the kora player as historian, witness, and keeper of collective memory. Long before written archives, griots documented lineages, migrations, and lives through story and song. This is why master kora player, Youba Cissokho, will participate with me: he carries seventy-two generations of history, not simply as inheritance, but as living knowledge. In this collaboration, the kora does not merely accompany the poem, it remembers with it.

I invite you to join us for this poetry event.