In Ghana, when people want to understand the state of the nation, they don’t wait for press conferences.
They listen to music.
They watch comedians.
They show up at poetry shows.
That’s where truth leaks.
It’s not that politicians aren’t speaking. It’s that the people stopped listening a long time ago. What they crave is meaningnot metrics. Emotion, not just economics. And in that space between what’s official and what’s felt, poetry steps in.
I know, because I’ve lived it.
Within a decade, I’ve used slam poetry not to entertain, but to organize. To heal, question, mobilize, and provoke. As Ghana’s Slam Master, I’ve led poets from crowded community centers in Accra to championship stages in Brazil, Togo, and most recently Mexico, where Ghana became the World Poetry Slam Champion in 2025.
But the real work?
It happens long before the spotlight.
It happens in the dark where a line of verse becomes a young man’s first taste of voice. Where a stage becomes safer than the streets. Where applause means: you matter.
We’ve Been Doing Public Service. It Just Doesn’t Look Like a Policy Brief.
Our poets have tackled mental health, gender violence, corruption, colonial memory, and climate grief, all in three-minute bursts that hit harder than any budget speech ever could.
I’ve seen teenage girls who wouldn’t raise their hand in class bring entire rooms to silence with a single poem. I’ve watched boys who once mocked poetry become its fiercest protectors. Not because it rhymes but because it resonates.
Poetry isn’t soft power. It’s surgical. It goes where the press doesn’t. Says what the minister won’t. It reaches the grandmother in the market and the youth scrolling on TikTok. It translates policy into pulse.
If We Treated Poetry Like We Treat Public Health…
What if every civic campaign had a slam poet?
What if development agencies hired poets as translators not of language, but of intention?
What if funding art wasn’t charity, but strategy?
In 2025, we didn’t just bring home a trophy. We brought back a message: Africa’s voice doesn’t need validation. It needs a mic.
I Don’t Just Do Poetry. I Do Infrastructure.
No, I don’t lay bricks. But I build something harder to measure, belief.
And in a world where people feel unheard, unseen, and unloved, belief is everything.
So don’t ask me if I’m an artist.
Ask me what I’m building.
Because poetry is a place.
A platform.
A protest.
A public service.
And some of us show up to serve every single time a Poet pick up the mic.
📩 Let’s Work:
- Invite me to speak about arts-for-impact, cultural strategy, or civic storytelling.
- Partner with Ehalakasa, Ghana’s slam poetry movement, to run workshops, campaigns, or community events.
- Sponsor Ghana’s Slam Champions to carry our stories to the world and bring new ones back home.