Sometimes a word or an argument will trigger a poem.
AMA ATA AIDOOI always wanted to write poetry, even when I was very young.
More Ama Ata Aidoo Quotes
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Soyinka’s Death at Dawn, Auden’s Musée des Beaux Arts, Stevie Smith’s Not Waving but Drowning and Wislawa Szymborska’s Some People come to mind immediately. But there are plenty, plenty more that I enjoy.
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I’ve written poems about gifts.
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Ghana is like a lion without a head
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It is a matter of some interest, that the only other volume A Mouth Sweeter Than Salt reminds one of is Ake, by Wole Soyinka. What is it about these Yorubas?
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They had always told me that I wrote like a man.
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Its a sad moment, really, when parents first become a bit frightened of their children.
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Time by itself means nothing, no matter how fast it moves, unless we give it something to carry for us; something we value. Because it is such a precious vehicle, is time.
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No matter what anybody says, we can’t have it all. Not if you are a woman. Not yet.
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After all, if we look closer into ourselves, shall we not admit that the warmth from other people comes so sweet to us when it comes, because, we always carry with us the knowledge of the cold loneliness of death?
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Things are working out… towards their dazzling conclusions.
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At the age of 15, a teacher had asked me what I wanted to do for a career, and without knowing why or even how I replied that I wanted to be a poet.
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For us Africans, literature must serve a purpose: to expose, embarrass, and fight corruption and authoritarianism.
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I always wanted to write poetry, even when I was very young.
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There are powerful forces undermining progress in Africa. But one must never underestimate the power of the people to bring about change.
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Humans, not places, make memories.
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