Paper Dolls by Nyachiro Lydia Kasese

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“Is a war still a war if only one person is fighting?” Startling revealing rumbles like these, litter the ‘chap-book’ that is the poetry anthology by Nyachiro Lydia Kasese, named ‘Paper Dolls’. No more than 31 pages, the booklet is a charming debut by this contemporary female writer from Tanzania.

Lydia Kasese reading a few poems
from her book 'Paper Dolls' at Soma Cafe ni DSM recently

‘Paper Dolls’ takes you on a journey that explores perspectives with a strong feminine voice that is meandering, the happenstance of becoming. “There are freedom-fighting cockroaches in the pipes underneath my tub.” Her peculiar arrangement of words placing dark and reverent in one sentence, conjures her distinct voice.

Going through the 18 poems in ‘Paper Dolls’, there’s a percussive rhythm of indifference or acceptance if you will. As no matter how dark or light the subject matter is, the declarative reporting stance from the protagonist, allows for an observers security net.

Yet the searing manner in which the scenes unravel, “Someday your mothers tongue will be a lost tribe,-a testament to the new world of a past generation-that nurtures fear in their back gardens.” awakens you to a depth of feeling that has surely endured the ring of experience.

Among my favourite in ‘Paper Dolls’ are the poems ‘Flowering’ and ‘Accepted Standards’. Flowering captures well the definite attribute of Lydia’s literary style. That of relaying vivid scenes in a few words, as she paints from the crux of the story, so even though I don’t know how old Hadijah is, whether she is wearing a khanga or is wrapped in a ‘baibui’.

“Bougainvillea. For the year Hadijah was beaten to death, trying to protect her daughter from her husband. We fell on our faces. We became parched and dusty.” I can still vividly paint the scene, where she’s getting murdered, forge the story that sees her friends & family traumatised by her passing.

In ‘Accepted Hands’ Lydia explores the role of a young woman in Africa, her responsibility to her history, how she navigates the clauses of morality, while corresponding her new found freedoms in being exposed to the world. In this Paper Dolls, allows a bigger filter of experiences for the African female form.

Here Lydia even taps into the quandary of same sex relationships, at first subtly in the poem ‘Freedom-fighting cockroaches’ and later more boldly in the poem ‘Pursue’. “I’m swept off my feet.-But I’m a woman.-And so are you.”

Lydia works as a Media Planner by day; her literary works have appeared in Jalada’s Afrofuture(s) anthology, and her short story “Inside Outside” was long listed by Writivism and published in their 2014 anthology. Her poem ‘Things that were lost in our vaginas’ was short listed in the BNPA’s 2014, poetry competition.

This is her debut solo work, published this year by ‘The African Poetry Book Fund’; one can order the book online.

Article first published by The East Africa Newspaper...