Why poetry? It is not as paying as law.
[Passionately gesturing:] I went for poetry because it was fun; I actively started sharing my poetry in public in third year at Makerere. I went for my poetry performance at the National Theater and loved how words moved people.
You could have juggled law and poetry…
I realized that if l kept doing both, I would not give poetry enough time and so I gave up my career. I just loved poetry and believed in what it would do for my society. I joined the Lantern Meet of Poets and surprisingly, I met people who loved poetry the way I did but none was a student of literature. The group was full of engineers, lawyers and food scientists.
How did your choices affect your relationships?
It reached a time where everybody never wanted to look at me at home, apart from my dad. But now I am glad that my family members come in to watch my shows and even read about me in the newspapers and other platforms and they are happy for me.
Peter, you are quite confusing; you study law, drop it for poetry, but then end up teaching?
I started teaching when I finished my law course at Makerere University and was waiting to join Law Development Centre. I was teaching performance literature because I believed in its power.
I went to six community schools and was rejected because I was not a professional teacher. My father [David Alimwengeza] thought I was joking because I had gotten internship at one of the biggest law firms not only in Uganda but in Africa, here in Kampala. But that was not what I wanted; all I wanted was to teach poetry and literature. My father realised I was serious about it; so, he introduced me to one of his old friends who was a head teacher at Nabisunsa Girls School.
So, you got a job just like that?
No, the head teacher invited me to her office for an oral interview. She asked me why I loved literature and poetry. I told her the advantages of literature and promised I would be taking the students to the National Theater for recitation. The lady just looked at me like this [imitates the head teacher’s pleased look] and she told me I was hired.
You must be very good! Are you still teaching?
No, I quit teaching because I really wanted to concentrate on poetry and to also create more time for my personal talent.
So, there will be no Counsel Peter Kagayi?
The passion for poetry was too much. I burnt all my law books except the ones on Intellectual Property and Popular Development. I waited for some of my students that I had spotted with the same passion as me. When they were 18, we started off the Kitara Nation.
What is Kitara Nation?
It was named after Buyoro-Kitara and Kitara means sword. The reason we call ourselves Kitara Nation is because we believe Uganda is not the appropriate name for this country because if its colonial mispronunciation. Kitara connects all of us as Ugandans, because it’s our origin.
You have performed with your mother [Ruth Namusobya]; how did you get her to even support your project?
I was inspired by my greatest poet, Okot P’Bitek, who published his mother’s poems.
How did you realise she had the talent?
[Smiles] I started paying attention to how my mother insulted me; how she made everyone laugh and a point came when she would insult me and I just laugh. It was so dramatic. But the poetic [language] she used made me realise she was a poet. I later talked to her about writing her own poem and performing it at one of my shows. She said I would have to pay her and I accepted. She decided to write in Lusoga.
Why Lusoga?
I told her she would never be better than me in English. She started writing and stood out.
You give directions to a woman that gave birth to you!
It’s normal. At that moment she is not my mother but, rather, my student and she knows it too. She actually calls me her mentor, something I don’t take lightly. I pay her as equally as I pay the other performers. So in that space, she gets rid of the mother-son relationship.
Some of your poems were censored by government.
[Laughs loud] Yes, they were censored by the government body last year. The poems made some people at the National Theater uncomfortable and they called me and my team to tell us how they wanted to keep their jobs and that such poems should not be performed at the theater.Â
There was a show last year called Arrest The Poet and it was about Makerere University students who come and recite poems and then are arrested and killed. We were going to recite those specific poems. During rehearsals, the management would hear us and get worried. We were told to close the show on the day of the performance, something that was not accepted and so the show went on. But it is very true that my poems are actually being censored.
Which ones have been censored?
There is Give Me Yellow Blood, Oh Uganda May God Fart Upon Thee, I Used To Shout My Poems and Mr Poet Protester.
Hahaha…Oh Uganda may God what?! You are naughty. Do you sometimes get threatened?
Everyday. Sometimes strangers walk up to me after the show and tell me that I will get myself killed or arrested, or ask, ‘why are you so political?’ ‘Don’t you have other things to write about?’ ‘Has the police heard you?’ My friends too express genuine fear. [Hmmm, that would be Byron Kawadwa all over again, God forbid!]
Where do you get your ideas from?
From everywhere; the environment… I even once wrote a poem titled Nothing and it was about nothing. I do political, social and romantic poetry, depending on how I wake up.
Talking about romantic poems, are you dating…married?
[He shyly buries his head in his arms on the table in a long silence, then looks at Quick Talk:] What should I say? Tell me.
The answer, whether you are married.
No, I am not married. Yet. I don’t have kids. Yet. Although I am planning for them. [Inhales deeply, then silence.] Are you recording the silence or…?
Yes!
Okay. I am seeing someone.
Doesn’t your job affect your relationships?
Well, yes. However, I have been fortunate that the lady I am dating now understands me and my job.
How?
There is when I really need space, like when I am going to perform. I don’t like talking to anyone. It’s not ignoring you but I am busy. Some people get it while others don’t, and others think I overdo it, but I am a writer; so, how can you say I overdo it?
Where did you meet her?
This one I want to keep to ourselves.
Some people fall for their clients, students…
Eh. But love comes in many forms.
Have you been there, done that?
Yes, I have been a victim.
So, was she in your audience?
Eyo tuveeyo, Doreen. [Let it go, Doreen.]
I imagine poets are romantic. Do you buy flowers?
I believe in love. [Dramatically:] So, so much, but I also believe in honest expression. I will surely buy the flowers if you want to, but I also know that it’s a fallacy. I would really try to go out of my way to make you happy. I would write a poetry book about you and then we read it together. We would go out for movies, go shop together. I love reading so we write to each other too; amazing lines and essays.
Who is your ideal woman?
A woman who really, really likes reading, [with] a sense of humor, bold and conversational. We can even go for an outing in a bookshop.
Oh my. So, are you a metrosexual, gadgets guy or sportsman?
Sports, every day; however, it’s not that I don’t care about my looks.
Talking about looks; why the Afro?
I always wanted to grow my hair even in school and my mother kept telling me that I had poor-quality hair. Sadly, I went to schools where my hair was always cut off. However, when I got to university, I started growing my hair but people started telling me that lawyers don’t grow Afros; so, I had to cut it off always. But the moment I was done being a lawyer, I decided to do something that I always wanted.
How many pairs of shoes do you own?
[Laughs] I have nine, though there are official shoes that I wear when going to strike a deal. I prefer push-ins [Quick Talk finds him in push-ins].
I grew up in a family that didn’t have much; so, I treasure the little that I have, mostly shoes. I remember my first pair of shoes was my father’s; so, I hardly throw away shoes because every pair has a story to tell.
What is the one thing you can’t live without?
Family.