Chapbook Chats: Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto Interviews In These Bones, I Am Shifting Author Claudia Owusu
To celebrate KUMI New-Generation African Poets: A Chapbook Box Set, Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto is talking to poets whose chapbooks are included in the KUMI edition of the wonderful ongoing series. Enjoy this conversation between Chinua and poet Claudia Owusu.
Chinua Ezenwa-Ohaeto: Congratulations on the release of your chapbook, In These Bones, I Am Shifting, featured in the 2024 New-Generation African Poets series! Could you share your experience of seeing your work published in this acclaimed series, and what it means to you personally and professionally to be part of this important moment for African poetry?
Claudia Owusu: Seeing my work published in this acclaimed series is deeply affirming and encouraging. I have admired so many of the poets that have been published in this series, and the works I have read prior have been so integral in helping me discover my voice as a poet. Personally, it is an honor to be a part of this lineage of brilliant poets; and professionally, it provides me with merit, especially as I pursue higher education and continue studying and teaching within the subject matter. It is also a building arc for a full collection as I build a readership from the chapbook and onwards.
C. E-O: How did you arrive at the title for your chapbook?
C.O: The title is from a transitionary time in my life—it is part of a longer line “In These Bones I Am shifting; Forget Everything I’ve Said” which depicts, for me, the flippancy and overall shrug of youth, the freedom of not being held to what one has said, the gift of being able to reinvent and reimagine myself without restriction, especially as the narrative moves from girlhood to womanhood.
C.E-O: Can you talk about the organisation and how you chose the poems included in In These Bones, I Am Shifting?
C.O: I am deeply interested in stories of girlhood, womanhood, self-ownership, and redemption—I chose the poems through this narrative arc. I started off with stories of children and my home town, and then moved into ownership and reclamation, and then the shared loss or pain girls experience as we grow. I wanted to put these experiences and their feelings next to each other—girlhood, redemption, reclamation, ownership, and loss all in one—the sense of making do, not passively but actively rebuilding from what one has been handed. In summary, this is the life I am building from the girlhood I know. This is how I am giving myself back to myself.
C.E-O: In “Folktales,” the lineage of women in your family has a strong presence. How does this heritage inform your identity and artistic voice? Are there specific stories or lessons from this lineage that resonate with you?
C.O: I was raised by my aunts and passed through the hands of girl cousins all throughout my childhood. Now that I am older, I have a better understanding of the sacrifice and investments they put in me. So much of my work is brought out of that witnessing: my girlhood and womanhood, albeit in some ways self-taught, is also harvested from their lives and experiences. I am learning from their joys and heartbreaks, how they wrangle and hold their anger, how they keep themselves after everything or everyone else leaves. My voice is born from their collective gathering and the hope they have to make this life as full as they can for themselves.
C.E-O: The poem “Sister Efe” portrays and intertwines moments of fear and tenderness, particularly in how Sister Efe interacts with both the thief and the narrator’s family. How do these contrasting interactions reflect the broader social and cultural dynamics of the neighborhood, and what do they reveal about Sister Efe?
C.O: Growing up in Taifa has shaped so much of my work as a writer. Fear and tenderness, anger and love, were everyday backdrops, whether inside the house or outside the house gates. I think the contrasts reflect the social and cultural dynamics of looking out for own another, but also relying on shared communal narratives without proper inquiry—a sort of no questions asked policy, that in some ways, were helpful, but also harmful in other cases. For Sister Efe, she was positioned as this strong, irredeemable woman. That narrative alone made her out to be some sort of lost cause, but it also warranted fear which is like respect, and caused people to leave her alone. It gave her power, and maybe she was well-aware, and built into the lore about she and her sister, only allowing the mask to fall with the children in the neighborhood, towards whom she was kind and deeply nurturing.
C.E-O: You capture community dynamics of conflict and camaraderie in “My Grandma’s Face in the Storm,” and illustrate the chaotic scene in Accra vividly. How do community experiences shape your perception of belonging?
C.O: I think community experiences shape my perception of belonging in that they give me a role to play: when a conflict is ensuing, you inevitably have to get involved, whether as a witness or a peacemaker or translator. There is that echoing even days after a conflict has been resolved where people tell and retell the story, compare notes, etc. Conflict allows everyone to have a voice, to partake in a collective remembrance, whether they have close ties or not.
C.E-O: Your exploration of identity in the poem “Until I Am Put Back into the Ground as Someone Who No Longer Needs This” is poignant. What prompted you to reflect on the transition from girlhood to womanhood?
C.O: As I navigate womanhood, I have been trying to rewrite experiences of shame and interrogate them in order to recognize my own bravery. I have been curious about how to maintain a sense of girlhood even as we move into womanhood, how to keep that part of ourselves sacred, and how often girlhood is tied to our experiences of being mothered, hence “I want to be my mother’s daughter forever.” I was prompted to rewrite myself into this banner of love and protection, this place of unconditional care as my true and deserved place, a kind of grace without works or qualification.
C.E-O: The idea of bodily autonomy is powerful in your writing. How do you navigate personal ownership with societal expectations?
C.O: I have been navigating personal ownership with societal expectations by interrogating what I actually believe or what I don’t believe. It has been easier, especially in girlhood, to buy into lores and rules and other means of fear-mongering. But now, I ask: What do I think? Is this true for me? Does this belong to me? Is this fear, shame, guilt my own or somebody else’s?
C.E-O: Your poem “The Night I Leave Dansoman, Last Stop” expresses a deep sense of departure. What emotions do you associate with leaving Ghana, a place you’ve called home?
C.O: I feel a deep sadness whenever I am leaving Ghana—as someone living in the diaspora, there is a sense of mourning that comes with living away from home. The mourning comes from recognizing the potential of the country and the disparaging reality of what exists, and also, from simply missing the mundanity of the community and love I have come to know there.
C.E-O: You refer to your country as a “wedded ghost” in “The Night I Leave Dansoman, Last Stop.” Can you elaborate on what that metaphor means to you?
C.O: This metaphor was a way of categorizing the absence I feel in loving a country that is continuously failing the people I love, and thus, failing me. A wedded ghost is practically hopeless, in that there is a covenant of commitment, and yet it can’t be honored due to a certain obstruction or distance, which in the case of Ghana is the corruption, amongst other things.
C.E-O: Are there African poets who are of interest to you? How did they shape or influence your writing process?
C.O: I deeply admire and have been influenced by the work of Ladan Osman, Safia Elhillo, Aracelis Girmay, Poetra Asantewa, Henneh Kyereh Kwaku, Afua Ansong, amongst others. They have given me a certain liberty and access to the page, simply through their work and reflection of the times. It has given me an identity as a writer and helped me believe in the possibilities of the page, what can be reclaimed or salvaged there.
Chinụa Ezenwa-Ọhaeto is an Igbo and Nigerian poet, fiction and nonfiction writer, and essayist, exploring the themes of culture, religion, lineage, ancestry, divination (dibia afa), post-colonialism, migration and the complexities of existence. His full- length poetry collection, The Naming, will be out on December 1, 2025 with African Poetry Book Fund via Nebraska press. The Naming explores the movements, excesses, and extremes of existing as a postmodern individual, connecting these experiences to familial ancestry and lineage.