Isabelle Baafi is a writer and poet from London. Her debut pamphlet, Ripe (ignitionpress, 2020), was a winner of the 2021 Somerset Maugham Award, and was the PBS Pamphlet Choice for Spring 2021. She was also the winner of the 2019 Vincent Cooper Literary Prize, and was shortlisted for the 2021 Brunel International African Poetry Prize, and the 2020 Bridport Prize for Poetry. Her poems have been published in The Poetry Review, Magma, and elsewhere. She is a Ledbury Poetry Critic, an Obsidian Foundation Fellow, and a Board Member at Magma. She is currently writing her debut poetry collection.

Gregory McCartney: Hi Isabelle, welcome to the Honest Ulsterman and thanks for doing an interview with us. Can you tell us a bit about yourself and your background?

Isabelle Baafi: Thanks, Greg, it’s great to talk to you too.

In terms of my background, I was born in London, and I’ve lived here all my life. When I was five, a children’s author came to my school, and talked to us about how books are made. By that point I was already obsessed with books. That was the day I realised that I wanted to write them too.

As well as poetry, I write fiction, and I’m beginning to write more criticism. In the future, I would love to go into screenwriting as well (as I studied comp lit & film at undergrad, and I adore films).

GMCC: In Gravida, there’s a beautiful but I think quite sinister description of a birth carefully placed across four pages. Can you describe the creation of this poem? The placement of the words reminds me of computer coding. Can you explain the formatting of the poem?

IB: I came back to this poem many times, and each time I had a different preoccupation. For the first few drafts, I was simply thinking about the intimacy between mother and her unborn child. But then gradually I started to wonder about what it means to develop in the womb; how consciousness/the self literally forms; where it emerges from; and what it means to become self-aware: to recognise that self in union with, and later, in distinction to, the mother. At times, I was also thinking about the inherent desire to survive, and how — to pick up on your computer reference — that instinct is encoded into our being on a cellular level. Finally, the poem aims to provide hope in the face of miscarriage, and so it recounts three successive pregnancies. Each one ends prematurely, although not always with the same outcome. Each poem was written in the ‘normal’ way and then fragmented, in an attempt to represent foetuses gradually forming in the womb.

GMCC: Birth has often been described in violent terms but people seem to forget about what happens after. In the next poem PG Tips there seems to be a war between the baby and the mother. That first line is devastating: Because she came from me, they all conclude I can be trusted. And later: A midwife comes to check. On me? On her? To see who’s winning?  Was this a description of post-natal depression and perhaps a loss of self? 

IB: Yes, exactly. As I wrote the poem, I was once again thinking about the concept of selfhood, and who we belong to in various ways, and at various stages in our lives. I was thinking about the ties between a mother and child, and how they can impact our sense of identity, and sometimes create internal conflict.

GMCC: Hunger and desire haunt many of the poems often in relationship contexts. How easy to you find the autobiographical?

IB: The thing is, I don’t consider my poems to be autobiographical — even when they’re based on real events. In the introduction to her book, Electric Arches, Eve Ewing writes that her book is about “the places we invent. Every story in it is absolutely true.” That’s how I feel about my work. All of it is true and none of it is true. Of course, I draw from things that have I thought, felt, and experienced (and quite often, things that other people have thought, felt, and experienced, because my poems are not always about me). But whenever I draw from real events, rather than simply depicting what happened, I always try to figure out: what was really going on? What was happening under the surface? What was not being said? Why did things happen in the way that they happened? Or I’ll even try to see it from the other person’s perspective. That usually guides me into crafting a depiction that is faithful to the emotion and intellectual architecture of the situation, but not necessarily the facts. If you were to pick out specific details from my poems, most of them would not be factual.

GMCC: There’s something very visual, perhaps cinematic is a better word in your work, Hotboxing in particular. Is this something you cultivate or does it come unconsciously? 

IB: I’ve never thought about that before, so I suppose it’s mostly unconscious. But like any poet, I know the importance of vivid imagery, and I imagine that my knowledge of the other artforms (i.e., film) influences how I write.

GMCC: I love the last line of Simon Peter: This surface, blending light, into the swallowing tide below – what could be more divine than to walk upon it? There’s also an eroticism of word if that makes sense, something very earthy, very bodily, very hungry but also at the same time something aiming for the spiritual or transcendental in your work. Is that because of your faith?

IB: An “eroticism of word” is such a great phrase – thank you!

The poem is undoubtedly inspired by my faith, although it had never occurred to me to write poem from the perspective of a biblical figure before. I actually began the poem as a response to a late-19th century poem about fishermen, which I found to be quite reductive and narrow-minded in its depiction of the working class. The poem started out as a way of answering that perspective, in a way that revealed the intellectual richness of those who had been depicted as crude. But as I was writing it, I also wanted to dramatise the existential questions of life, in a way that any reader from any background or faith, could engage with.

GMCC: There’s religious imagery throughout the poems. I’m not particularly religious but I was brought up going to church so I know quite a few biblical stories and have used them as Abridged (the other poetry magazine I edit) metaphors now and again. There’s a great interview between Leonard Cohen and Andrew Eldritch (the Sisters of Mercy) in which they discuss the use of language in their songs. Cohen worries if contemporary generations are aware of the Story of Isaac for instance. Do you, when using such imagery, consider if they might not be familiar with it? Personally, I think people can easily look things up these days if they’re not familiar with something, but that might be just me!

IB: In terms of using imagery that people may not be familiar with, my thought is always if you know, you know. Even when I invoke a biblical reference, I never make that reference the cornerstone or foundation for understanding the poem. The reference is a way of enhancing what is already there.

For instance, in the poem ‘The Pastors Wife’, I use phrases like “the good sheep” and “the worthy lamb,” and the lines “Yes, I brought rope with me./ I knew what to expect” to reference the story of Abraham and Isaac on Mount Moriah. That biblical story depicts faith through submission and sacrifice. (There’s a little more to it than that, but I don’t want to go off on a tangent.) But even if someone didn’t know that reference, they would hopefully see how those ideas energise the poem. The poem itself explores how desire, faith, power, submission, and devotion are interwoven, and how they play out in a marriage where doctrines dictate individual behaviours.

To pick another example, in the poem ‘Gravida’ I use the phrase “let there be” which is from the book of Genesis. For someone who is familiar with that reference, and who therefore knows it as a command or decree, I think it would be interesting to see it used here as a plea instead. When we apply words that are so charged in an usual context, it can be a great of way of creating unexpected connections. In this case, a connection between the choice to create life versus the urge to be created. On the other hand, for someone who doesn’t know that reference, I think the phrase is still does what it’s supposed to.

GMC: How did you put Ripe together? I ask this question often but that’s because I’m always fascinated by the process and the editorial/curatorial decision making that enables a successful publication.

IB: It’s often hard for me to describe the process, because I didn’t know I was writing the pamphlet when I wrote each poem. After I was invited to submit a manuscript, I looked at the poems I had, and the ideas that I was most curious and eager to explore, and I realised that many of them had a consistent thread running through them. I picked poems which related to the concept of hunger in different, almost roundabout ways, and ordered them in a way that made sense to me. Then I sent them to the person who would later become my editor, and together we worked on the manuscript. As we went along, I added a few poems, and removed some others, and then I spent the next few months editing them until the manuscript was ready.

GMCC: On that note, I really like the front cover of Ripe. Many great collections have a terrible frontispiece. Is it your design?

IB: Thank you, I really like it too. The cover was designed by the talented Flora Hands, who designs all the covers for ignition press.

GMCC: You’ve said that ‘I’ve often heard, and I believe it to be true, that any poem written by a Black poet is de facto a “Black poem”, because even if the work doesn’t announce itself as being from that perspective, the poem is informed by the perspective of the writer, and it centres that experience.’ Is there, do you think, an expectation that black poets represent more than just themselves, particularly in the last few years with the rise of Black Lives Matter protests etc? This obviously isn’t something asked of white poets, though they of course for literary centuries represented particular classes and philosophies. The A security guard followed me through Boots line in Can I throw this one away and start again? for instance probably wouldn’t be written by a white person.

IB: Emphatically yes. There is definitely an expectation on Black poets to talk about certain issues, and to represent communities beyond themselves. Occasionally, I will get feedback or read a review which makes it clear that the person hasn’t really engaged with the ideas in my work; they’re just looking for signifiers of race and difference, and expressions of my existence in relation to whiteness (which I couldn’t care less about).

Also, the question “Is there an expectation that black poets represent more than just themselves” is really one that should be posed to white editors, agents, critics, interviewers, and other gatekeepers... Is that what you expect? If so, why? And how does that impact how you read their work?... Black poets should not be burdened with making sense of how white people read their work. White readers need to do that for themselves.

GMCC: How was/is the pandemic for you? Lots of writers/artists have found that they haven’t been as creative as they thought during it?

IB: The first lockdown in the UK started on the 18th of March, and on the 20th, I submitted my manuscript for the first time. So for me the pandemic has been a time of hard graft, amazing opportunities, developing my work, and making loads of great connections. Of course, it has also been incredibly frustrating and isolating at times. But the entire process has really inspired and encouraged me to keep going, and I’ve received some lovely messages from people who have been impacted by the work, people who see aspects of themselves in the work, people who are teaching some of the poems. To be able to reach people in that way is all a writer can ever ask for.

GMCC: How would you recommend our readers to read? I think you’re a fan of Safiya Sinclair, (interviewed in the HU a few years ago). Anyone else?

IB: Safiya is so bold in her choices; I’ve learned a lot from reading her poems. Some of the other poets that I can’t get enough of at the moment include Terrance Hayes, Caroline Bird, and Ada Limón.

GMC: And the inevitable last question, what’s next for you?

IB: I’ll be starting a Masters in Creative Writing in September. I’m hoping to use that time to complete my debut collection, begin writing a novel, and also dip back into screenwriting — so I’m excited about that.

GMCC: Thanks again, Isabelle! 

IB: Thanks, Greg!

You can buy Ripe here: https://shop.brookes.ac.uk/product-catalogue/faculty-of-humanities-social-sciences/poetry-pamphlets/ripe-by-isabelle-baafi