The lost poems of New Orleans [US]:
As the murky waters swelled in his New Orleans bungalow, Niyi Osundare's first instinct wasn't to preserve himself. Instead, he frantically moved his manuscripts from file cabinets and bedside table to higher bookshelves until his wife, Kemi, warned, "Niyi, we'll drown trying to save the poems. Let's go to the attic."
After 26 hours trapped in the attic, the couple was rescued. But Mr. Osundare, widely considered Nigeria's leading poet, still mourns his lost "babies" -- 300 unpublished poems, written in longhand over 20 years, ranging from satires on Nigerian political corruption to a meditation on the beauty of Mt. Monadnock in southern New Hampshire.
This entry was posted by Ivy
on Tuesday, November 01, 2005 at 11:48 PM.
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