Title: Unashamed
Author: Bisola Bada
Genre: Poetry
Publisher: Aceworld publishers
Year of Publication: 2022
Reviewer: Babatunde Adeleke
By the second read through Unashamed by Bisola Bada, I came away with the conclusion of the biblical progenitors – Adam and Eve, who were said to be walking in the garden of Eden naked and unashamed. She bares all, leaving nothing behind. In the pages of Unashamed she holds nothing back and that is what makes this body of work beautiful — This chap is a rebellion, it is a song of war, mustering women everywhere and bringing them into the fight for more.
like this poem itself
the girl in this poem
does not take orders
As a debutant author, she brings with her a load of experience, of stories yet untold. Unashamed is a body of work that revolves around shared experiences for women and particularly for the author.
Born a woman – that shouldn’t need an explanation
From Genesis, the start of the chap, the author begins with her origin story.
i am not without
a genesis
I emerge from a lineage
of persons
who carry tomorrow
in their wombs
She is not afraid to identify with her source and this is the powerful tone that sets the ball rolling. The pieces that begin the chap are simple, self-explanatory and to the point. There are subtle figures of speech. In bold, there are allusions to the stretch marks. It is a prominent feature of African women in particular, Bisola concludes:
…for no sky is without
black spots
yet it doesn’t stop
to birth sun & moon & stars
Oh, that women would know that their stretch mark, the absence or presence is not an impediment to how they ought to live their lives. The piece Autumn shares the same message; that a woman does not consist in the features that she possesses or does not. In her royal majesty, the author brings the usual powerful imagery of a woman as a flower and turns it on its head. The stubborn line is still in there, a line that runs through the length of the entire chap.
this kind of poem
will not kneel
to the ego of a man.
The poems in this section set the tone for the girl child. There is a strong message and some resonance, and that is exactly what is delivered here. It is ‘in your face’ feminism – but you want it to be like that, you want to feel the drive. You can get annoyed by it too, or slightly irritated by it. Being born a woman shouldn’t need an explanation but in the world we live in, it does.
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If there is any guile of unintentionality when you start reading, the author soon shatters it. From the poem endangered, you know that this is a fight and it is a war she is not ready to lose.
but how do I
write this on paper
when this poet
& her gender are
endangered species in
the fist of patriarchs
& misogynists.
this section of the poem is replete with imageries, forms and figures of speech that contribute to pushing the conversation forward and the entire chapbook in the right direction. Like the fearless warriors that she expects all women to be, the author deploys forms in but, contrasting between the left and the right. She reinstates that the woman is made for herself.
you are not made
just for him
not for the fire that
wilds inside him
not for every rising
below his torso
Not a doll addresses the same societal expectations, a woman is first for herself and not for anyone else. It is getting personal really fast; it is also in this period that females get assaulted the most. About 82% of all juvenile sexual assault victims are female. In Universe, bad sms to a rapist and I forgive myself, the author takes readers through the phases of attraction, molestation, and the process of forgiveness after such a drastic act.
This woman, the human that the author propels through this chapbook is an idealist, this side comes to life in I want a world where – many of the demands are fairly normal, however some prey on the figures of language to assume normality. In Woman, the narrative is flipped from the gentle voice on the phone at the other end who wants to make small talk to a triggered woman who retorts, “exactly, yea. a misogynist doesn’t make sense to me, either.”
In defense of the feminist
Reading to this point, one would think the author is a man-bashing feminist, this section, beginning from not a misandrist, she pays respect to her father;
i wouldn’t be writing this
poem without a farmer—
dad who seeded me
on the fertiles of mom
She does the same in to the man, applauding the man who christened her. She questions the logic of boys and why they lie. In an untitled piece, she writes:
I still don’t understand
why these boys
taught their tongues
to speak untrue truths
they flatter rivers
to fish their treasures
The author is out for something, she is not a misandrist, that much is clear. Why then is she putting on a hard shell? She questions the same logic herself;
born, a girl,
the world thinks
of me as fragile
maybe it is right
maybe not
It is an introspection, it is a questioning. And it is so sleek that it joins fitly wiother partsart of the poems and it leads to the end. Where the author takes the reader on a voyage, it closes off on a high endnote where the author again clarifies her stance on being a woman and unashamedly so.
i did not choose to
be a woman. i was
chosen to be a woman
& i choose to remain
as a woman
Her deeeeee of the woman folk stands secured though, she enthuses:
after all the poems
i have written
it is safe to say that
no woman is bad
just a few humans
A crisp, understandable collection that is as endearing as it is fast-paced, Bisola Bada is forceful, she gets her point across without innuendos. You either love or hate her, there is no in between on this one.
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