Publication Day At Last

At last, publication day is upon us: 1st October 2020, National Poetry Day! Locating Strongwoman is a portrait of unperformed femininity. Eschewing the stereotypical portrayal of the “Strong Woman” and the even more loaded “Strong Black Woman”, these poems invite […]

BRITISH VOGUE

Of all the things I though would give me bragging rights when I’m old and boring my niece and nephews with ‘when I was young’ stories, being featured in British Vogue wasn’t one of the things I thought would happen. […]

Translating Academia through Creative Writing

Poetry is how I make sense of the world. This the one answer that never goes away when I’m asked about my relationship with poetry. It should be no surprise then, that I keep looking for new things to explore […]

Mama I’m in the Guardian! & I’m going to be publsihed!!

For close to a decade now, people have been asking me if and when I’m going to publish a collection of poetry and my answers always have some tinge of; when the time is right, when I find the right […]

White Review Poetry Prize 2018

Photo by Carrie Mae Weems (part of the Kitchen Table Series)Christmas came early in 2018 when I was shortlisted for the White Review Poetry Prize, one of only 8 people that made it that far. As part of that privilege, […]

Ilé La Wà promo on London Live

With less than a week to go before the 4 show run of Ilé La Wà at Stratford Circus, Tolu stopped by the London Live studio to discuss her debut play.

Fighting To Be British

I wrote a blog for Refugee Week which begins: “Men the age of my father don’t cry in public, don’t watch helpless whilst others speak for them. Not in my community—where women of this same generation raised children not to […]

What better way to celebrate Arts Council funding than with a press release?

ILÉ LA WÀ PRESS RELEASE Image can be downloaded here & trailer can be viewed here For IMMEDIATE RELEASE: 24 May 2018 Ilé La Wà deals with issues of immigration, deportations and the Windrush Scandal ‘You have chosen Britain but has it chosen […]

Anthropology of Belonging – Learning to Trust the Process

2018 started with a commission from BBC World Service to write a poem for the radio show ‘Cultural Frontline’. Definitely worth a listen. My voice was in great company. But the finished product is only ever half the story. It doesn’t […]

Learning to Trust the Process

“Only those who will risk going too far, can possibly find out how far one can go” TS Elliot My autopilot broke yesterday. It felt like an outer-body experience. I was moving but going nowhere fast and I didn’t have […]