“…what I’ve come to learn is that the world is never saved in grand messianic gestures, but in the simple, accumulation of gentle, soft, almost invisible acts of compassion.”
Chris Abani
From a TED talk recorded February 2008 in Monterey, California
I’ve just gotten home from spending 4 days at the largest poetry event in the known multiverse. I was sure I would have so much to say, but surprisingly I don’t.
Maybe it’s because I worked the event, and I’m still feeling exhausted. Or perhaps its because I’m still blissed out on what I did hear.
I feel like I’m still assimilating and absorbing some of what I heard.
I will say this. Undoubtedly, the highlight for me was getting to meet a writer that I have long admired. His novels are achingly beautiful, and as I discovered from listening to him read, so are his poems.
I speak of the amazing Nigerian writer and poet Chris Abani. I must admit that I have a total writers crush on his work. It is extraordinary. He published his first novel when he was 16. The novel, called Masters of the Board, is a political thriller about a failed Nigerian coup. The story was convincing enough that he was thrown in jail by the Nigerian government under suspicion of inciting a real-life coup. He was arrested twice more, put in solitary confinement and tortured. Much of his poetry is based on the harrowing experiences of the time he spent in prison.
What I find particularly remarkable is that while he writes about the darkest recesses of the human soul, his work is uncompromisingly life and humanity affirming. He writes with a beautiful juxtaposition of darkness and light. He is a truly “human” writer if that makes any sense. He’s also very kind, funny and gracious.
At the end of one of his readings my friend was standing behind a woman who turned to her companion and said “He is a miracle of a poet”. I couldn’t have said it better myself.
I was able to listen to him several times, got a book signed and even talked to him briefly and asked a couple of questions, which he graciously answered. And look….I even got my picture taken with him 
