Adisa: The Return of the Kung Fu Metaphors
Incorporating martial art movement with performance poetry, the poet Adisa does lyrical and physical battle with the forces of ignorance that permeate society. Drawing upon the mythology behind the martial art forms, Adisa parts the waters to touch the treasure within.
Poetry is not dead. It does not belong in books. It lives in a ‘knife hand chop’ or a ‘round house flying kick’. Poetry is action. It lives in the moving meditation of our daily lives.
“I saw children stand up and recite their poems that I’d hardly heard speak all year.”
‘At the end of his last performance one of the students who is usually very quiet and retiring looked at me and said Do you know, Miss, he makes me feel like writing a poem.”
Biography
Adisa means “one who makes his meanings clear” - and this is exactly what Adisa Stephen-Ezeocha does in performance. In 1994 he won the national Performance Poet of the year, run by Apples and Snakes and judged by Benjamin Zephaniah & Lemn Sissay. Benjamin Zephaniah later said “Adisa is the future - it’s so good to have something to look forward to”. Since then Adisa has performed in theatres and festivals all over the world, from Barcelona to Botswana, Amsterdam to Mozambique.
