I do poetry for humanity – Hafsat Abdullahi
Hafsat Abdullahi, popularly known as Havfy, is a multiple award-winning poet, fashion enthusiast, and model. She is also a member of the Grammys Recording Academy and a passionate writer. At just 24 years old, the Nigerian influencer has garnered a following of over one million across social media platforms. Through her voice and platform, she […]
hafsat abdullahi
Hafsat Abdullahi, popularly known as Havfy, is a multiple award-winning poet, fashion enthusiast, and model. She is also a member of the Grammys Recording Academy and a passionate writer. At just 24 years old, the Nigerian influencer has garnered a following of over one million across social media platforms. Through her voice and platform, she advocates for music, women, girls, and youth in underrepresented communities. In this interview, she talks about societal issues and suggests possible solutions.
Your poem “To the Girl in English Class” went viral for its exploration of culture as language and how we carry that into foreign spaces. How significant was that theme to you?
I have a reputation for writing about my feelings. It was personal, and I didn’t give too much thought to the theme, the structure or its impact. I was tired, and I just wanted to speak my truth and call out all “the girls in English class” who have a tendency to ridicule people for having an accent when speaking the English language. But from the number of reactions I got, it was evident; that my struggle is global. It resonated with a lot of people who may have experienced similar ridicule from people who measure our worth by how fluent we are in another man’s language. The people gave significance to the theme, it was a big culture shift. People now get ridiculed for ridiculing people’s accents.
Did you anticipate the level of attention the poem received?
I had hoped for some type of reaction; hopefully a positive reaction from my small community of fellow scholars. But 4.6 million views and hundreds of thousands of reactions from across countries and continents was not what I expected. So yes, I did anticipate attention, but no, not as much as I did. Not on a global scale.
If you could read only one poem for the rest of your life, which would it be and why?
Given the complexity of life, I think it would be unfair to put me in such a difficult situation. Each poem serves a different purpose to me. There are days I don’t feel good, and I need some type of energy boost; there are also days I need a little bit of melancholy, a little bit of humour and maybe a little romance. I don’t think I would want to read just one poem for the rest of my life. I’d rather read none.
Could you walk us through your journey into literature? What first drew you to poetry?
I started writing at a very young age, I can’t put my finger on dates exactly since it wasn’t an intentional thing at first. But I’d say as young as 5 years of age while I was in nursery school. But I didn’t start as a poet. In fact! I used to dislike poetry. I thought it was pretentious because I didn’t understand what the poets were rambling about, and I didn’t think even they (the poets) knew what they were talking about. I did more prose and storytelling. I really loved telling stories so much that I would scribble a lot of outrageous scenarios from my head and have all my friends sit and listen to me in excitement. My first real contact with poetry was Niyi Osundare’s poem “Killing Without a Sword”. It was the first poem that I read that resonated with me and made sense. I found it lying around in one of my sister’s literature textbooks, and after I read it, it made me laugh, but in a good way. It felt like the advice I didn’t know I needed, and it was after that I reconsidered my opinion about poetry and started reading more and more poems. Turns out, the poets really knew what they were talking about. I just needed to be more discerning. That was the start of my poetry journey.
Why performance poetry?
The ideal thing to say is that I do poetry because I have a big passion for humanity and positive change, and poetry is the only way I know how to contribute my quota to that cause. While that is partly the truth, the answer beyond the surface isn’t as deep as it seems. It’s even cliche, but I believe it’s cliche because most artists say it a lot, but we say it a lot because it’s the truth, and there is no better way to say it. Poetry chose me. I wasn’t born with a pen in my hand, I didn’t go searching for answers. I was just a typical kid who had a very hyper imagination and loved telling stories. Poetry was just a product of the not-so-intentional journey of my self-discovery. It was a craft I delved into for fun and realised I was effortlessly good at. But as I grew older, my personality and values also grew more complex and my “why” also evolved. Now, I have realised the power of my craft, and I’m making intentional moves to turn my poetry into a tool that can make people and the world a better place.
As a girl child activist and a woman, do you think young Nigerian women need to act fast, given the current socio-economic situation?
If we don’t act now, then when? Of course, we need to act with urgency because the earlier is always better. The consequences of inaction are more problems and more liabilities and that is expensive. The move to a more sustainable socio-economic future should start immediately.
Are poets doing enough to inspire this urgency, or do you think more can be done?
I don’t believe I’m doing enough and I don’t believe others like me are doing enough because there is no such thing as “enough” if the goal is yet to be met. Every day, poetry should consistently serve as a constant reminder of the need to redeem our pledges and commitments to positive changes in our immediate societies. Aside from talking, we also need to actively take part in the execution of these solutions.
Can you share how your upbringing shaped your poetic sensibilities? Were there key experiences that influenced your idea of the world?
I grew up in a typical lower-class Nigerian household, and through education and my craft, I have upgraded my social class over the years. Honestly, my childhood was not dramatic, nothing special or profound. But I think one key experience that might have influenced my character development was that my parents were around through it all. It was in the little things; my father did show up for my graduation ceremonies despite his workload while my mother worked hard in the market and still attended PTA meetings. One thing was constant, they were there, through it all. They weren’t the most buoyant of parents, weren’t the most educated, and we didn’t share similar opinions about life in general, but they were present and tried to get involved in the ways they could.
In what ways are performance poetry and music similar?
They are practically the same thing(lyrics). Poetry is written in lines and verses and so is music. They both have rhymes and rhythm, and they’re both a form of performance. They both can be accompanied by musical instruments, and they can be performed without any musical instruments. The only disparity is that one is spoken, and the other is sung to soothe the rhythm of any recurring musical instrument.
Is there an emerging poet you’d like to acknowledge?
They are so many and I feel so bad having to mention just one. But if I must, I’d like to give a shoutout to young Daniel Ogbebor Chukwuemeka. He’s a gem and one of my most faithful followers.