Our last feature poet on the #FloETIC2017 series today is ………………………….. drum rolls*
Name is Caleb Nnamani Caleb hence the stage name ‘CNC’. He’s currently a Biochemistry undergraduate at the University of Lagos and hails from Enugu State. He started the business of writing poetry in August 2016 and hasn’t looked back since then. He’s a national award winner of a poem competition and was a runner up at the 2017 Rhyme and Reason #Eversion Slam event held in Lagos, Nigeria.
His idea of poetry is;
“Poetry is a beautiful form of art, arguably the most beautiful. This is validated by the delicately charming means by which it captures the very imaginations of a person and expresses it with uncommon clarity to the universe. This in itself is magical. So poets are, in all honesty, magicians with a resident ability to invent.
With that said, I can only stress the point that poetry is to me a weapon of expression. By this I mean that the best way to effectively convey or communicate a message in it’s most lucid form is through the mechanism of poetry. A poem titled ‘Hands’ by Sarah Kay was widely reviewed around the world as a ‘revealing’ poem. The poem specifically talks about the human hands and the way we use them to communicate symbols and messages. This of course is not new to any person. But through the terrifically expressive tool of poetry, Sarah had millions of people around the world intrigued and even astounded as the reality of their own hands was shown from the magical and inventive mind of the potess.
It is a common experience for Nigeria based poets like me to receive messages from the audience of our works about how much they could relate to the poems. That is the power of poetry. Poetry makes the hearts of the speaker and the hearer resonate at one frequency. It is the best way to say anything that should be said. And it has no limits. From the streets to the offices. From the bars to the church. It remains the matchless form of expression between language speaking persons.
The richness of poetry facilely allows it to be of great relevance to the world of arts in general. Being the master of expressive art, it can be fused with other forms of art to create what can be called an upgraded version of the art. The integration of poetry with any form of art modifies and beautifies it, while boosting the level of expression the art carries. This reality is seen and expressed in major shows around the world. The PIA tour for example which is the biggest poetry show in the world, expresses poetry in forms fused with drama, stage play, music and so on. Even the #Eversion show which held in Lagos two months ago was a beautiful depiction of fused poetry. Different dance and music genres was fused with poetry to give a fascinating outcome which left the entire audience charmed and intrigued.
Art forms like photography and painting are not in anyway left out. Awe-inspiring pictures. many times are released with poems to further strike more cords in the heart of the viewers. And in the comparison of painting to poetry, legendary painter Leonardo Da Vinci has this to say– “painting is poetry that is seen instead of felt”. This comparison tells us that the interworking of poetry and other art forms will always modify and ameliorate them. Hence it is no wonder that some of Da Vinci’s legendary paintings were released with highly panegyrised poems.
Poetry remains the chief form of art expression. And it’s relevance to the arts is in its ability to be fused into other forms of art as it modifies and beautifies them. Poets can therefore be seen as magicians, with wands that can ultimately transform the world of arts. Yes, we are that powerful!”
You can rhyme words with him across social media at – cnc_empire
And it’s a wrap!