Award-winning poet and new Young People’s Laureate for London Theresa Lola reads from her debut poetry collection.
In Search of Equilibrium (Nine Arches Press) is an extraordinary and exacting study of death and grieving. Lola identifies where the algorithms of the body and the memory fail, and finds the words that will piece together the binary code of family and restart the recovery programme. These unflinching poems work towards the hard-wired truths of life itself, finding hope in survival, lines of rescue in faith and a stubborn equilibrium in the equations of loss and renewal.
‘a powerful and rigorous interrogation of a loved one’s death and its effect on faith. Theresa Lola has composed a glorious hymn to being alive and wounded, in a dazzling array of images, psalms, anti-prayers, Hip Hop, Strange algorithms and wiki entries. These are brutally tender poems, carved straight from the heart’ – Pascale Petit
Theresa will read from her work, followed by a Q & A and book signing.
Theresa Lola is a British Nigerian poet, recently awarded the role of Young People’s Laureate for London. In 2018 she was the joint winner of the Brunel International African Poetry Prize, was invited by Sadiq Khan to read a commissioned poem at the unveiling of Millicent Fawcett’s statue, and launched her magazine for writers FourHubs. She was 2017 Hammer and Tongue National Slam champion, and has led workshops and performed across the UK and abroad. She is a graduate of the Barbican Young Poets programme and part of the Octavia Women of Colour Collective.
This event is presented by Apples and Snakes and Tate Enterprises.
