Hands Washing Water

by Chris Abani

Chris Abani’s fourth poetry collection, Hands Washing Water, is a mischievous book of displacement, exile, ancestry, and subversive humor. The central section, “Buffalo Women,” is a Civil War correspondence between lovers that plays on our assumptions about war, gender, morality, and politics. Abani’s writing is ruthless, boldly engages with trauma, and is filled with surprising twists and turns.

Genres: Poetry, Africa, African Literature

90 pages, Paperback

First published October 1, 2006

About the author

Christopher Abani (or Chris Abani) is a Nigerian author.

He was a political prisoner in Nigeria at various times during 1985 and 1991. At times he was held in solitary confinement and he was held on death row for some time after being sentenced to death for treason.

He is a Professor at the University of California, Riverside and the recipient of the PEN USA Freedom-to-Write Award, the 2001 Prince Claus Awards, a Lannan Literary Fellowship, a California Book Award, a Hurston-Wright Legacy Award and the Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award. Selections of his poetry appear in the online journal Blackbird.

Reviews

[Lauren · Rating 5 out of 5]

"I cannot crawl into the tombs and cannot explain why. How do you say in my country they buried me alive for six months?...
Rabab tells me: We know how to build graves here. I nod. I know. It is the same all over Africa."

~From "Hanging in Egypt with Breyten Breytenbach"

In this collection, Abani notes his travels, poetic observations in towns as different as Harare, Zimbabwe to Walcott, Massachusetts, US. Part II of the book, "Buffalo Women", is a fictional account of two lovers' and their letter correspondence during the Civil War. It was a fantastic piece that challenges what we think we know about historical events.

[Trish · Rating 5 out of 5]

”We are lucky to live now, I mean, look how far we’ve come.”—from “Foucault’s Funk”

Chris Abani, when when asked by Walter Mosley in 2010, said he was a novelist first because he thought in stories. He works on poetry and novels concurrently, using one to break the logjams of the other. He works constantly.

The poems in this connection are food, a kind of fruit we have never tasted before, good in our mouth but unfamiliar on our tongue. We try something new in every poem, moving from Paris to the Caribbean, from California to New Zealand. Africa is there, and New York, Harare, Egypt, and Antwerp. At the pyramids

"Rabab tells me: We know how to build graves
here. I nod. I know. It is the same all over Africa."

One extraordinary twelve-part poem, “Buffalo Women,” imagines the correspondence between a white woman and a recently emancipated slave who is fighting in the Civil War. The agony of their separation and the possibility of no return is everywhere evident.


In “A Warrior’s Pride,” we learn to sharpen a broadsword till it cleaves a single blade of grass. Soot, ash, water, stone.

”Grandfather says:
Heed this! A severed head cannot be put back
This is a warrior’s wisdom.”

In Auckland, Abani feels at home. Sometimes mistaken for a Maori (“It can be dangerous”), he says

"All of me meets here, an alchemy of parts--
the Pacific of residence, the Atlantic of birth,
the English of heritage, and a culture, like mine,
old enough to have words for birthing the earth."

My favorites in the collection are “Low-Down Dirty Blues,” written for Walter Mosley, and “Harare” which has a refrain in each stanza “This is kwela.” Kwela is a distinctive pennywhistle-based jazzy urban street music from South Africa (according to Wikipedia) that has influenced Western music, notably Paul Simon’s album “Graceland” (released in 1986). Another favorite in this collection is

Unfinished Symphony


The light this morning is an aria,
I turn back to the stirring of the coffee.
A way to ground this time
between the hush and the turning. Outside
a hummingbird is spreading rumors
among flowers. Even now.
Even after all the wounds have healed,
I scratch around a phantom scab, avoiding
what lies beneath. When I open the window,
rosemary and thyme spill in.
Later I will loam in the herb garden,
crumbling the dirt, whispering dirges,
spicing the plants with sharpness. For now,
there is Percival’s painted fire
and the coffee. Sometimes
it is enough.

In a TED talk filmed in 2008, Abani told us about seeding the names of the dead, singing melancholic dirges while planting. When it comes time to harvest, joyful songs commemorate the village’s newborns. The other reference in this poem is to the paintings of novelist Percival Everett.


This collection, first published in 2006 by Copper Canyon Press, is now available as an ebook by that publisher. The Notes at the end of this collection give the reader a frame of reference for each poem, except for the title poem, which has no notes.

[missy jean · Rating 5 out of 5]

These poems blew me away. I've long been a fan of Chris Abani, but this collection was full of heart-squeezing surprises and acerbic beauty.

[Jessica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing poems - I had to put the book down for a day after I read Buffalo Women

[Mariclare Forsyth · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some stunning poems, like "The New Religion" which changed my life, some not so great, generally a lovely offering by a fascinating poet.

[Malika · Rating 4 out of 5]

This collection demonstrates why Abani is a such a masterful poet. He language is fluid and lyrical, and is littered with imagery that is effective whilst using economical language. An example - "flat rooftops spread out like conference tables" - in the poem "Hanging in Egypt with Breyten Breytenbach. Abani effortlessly covers migration, displacement, history, race, as well as the horrors of war in this collection. Yet my favourite poem in this book is the series of Epistles in the middle section of the book. Letters between lovers that are frank, beautiful and harrowing. Abani eloquently uses the long poem "Buffalo Women" to explore the realities of an interracial lesbian couple writing to each other during the American Civil War, where one of them is a black woman pretending to be a man and enlisted as a soldier. it is brutally beautiful and a must read,

[Mel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Chris Abani did his reading today and it was a-mazingly powerful. Chris' poems are hard to read, difficult to think about, but necessarily wonderful too.

[Michael Forsyth · Rating 2 out of 5]

"the new religion" is a beautiful poem. The rest is much less so. There are profound parts to many of the poems here but for me, the poems fall apart.
Partly this is due to the work feeling disjointed at best: if there's a through line between the poems, it's distance I suppose, but even that connection doesn't hold true throughout the book. I suppose this is a thing that happens with books of poetry, as they exist more or less as compilations of the poet's best works over a period of time.
But I find a lack in poetic style here. Or I just disagree with the sensibilities. The title image - hands washing water - is written in the book I believe 4 times. It is clear that the poet thinks this is a cool restructuring of a common phrase, and speaks to an inner truth that is deep. I think it does speak to a deeper truth! But I think that the reiteration of the phrase minimizes it's impact and also emphasizes what's problematic in it - that water is not in fact washed by hands. This difference in sensibilities runs through the whole work and took away from my enjoyment.

[Mary McAfoose · Rating 3 out of 5]

"Buffalo Women" was amazing. Others I didn't connect to as much.

[Jason Ly · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really liked the buffalo women part

[McCain Library]

This title is available as an eBook through McCain Library and can be accessed here: https://agnesscott.on.worldcat.org/oc...

[Kate Savage · Rating 3 out of 5]

The fault is probably my skull, but this collection of poetry didn't make much of a mark on my brain. It's well worth reading for this one poem, though:

THE NEW RELIGION

The body is a nation I have not known.
The pure joy of air: the moment between leaping
from a cliff into the wall of blue below. Like that.
Or to feel the rub of tired lungs against skin-
covered bone, like a hand against the rough of bark.
Like that. "The body is a savage," I said.
For years I said that: the body is a savage.
As if this safety of the mind were virtue
not cowardice. For years I have snubbed
the dark rub of it, said, "I am better, Lord,
I am better," but sometimes, in an unguarded
moment of sun, I remember the cowdung-scent
of my childhood skin thick with dirt and sweat
and the screaming grass.
But this distance I keep is not divine,
for what was Christ if not God's desire
to smell his own armpit? And when I
see him, I know he will smile,
fingers glued to his nose, and say, "Next time
I will send you down as a dog
to taste this pure hunger."

[Naori · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fiery and evocative, this collection of poetry by Abani is a deep expression of humanity. Themes of war, post-colonial violence, and absence proliferate the text, as well as longer contemplations on the role of the soldier/warrior. Not the most lyrical poetry, but very emotive and engaging in a way that forces you to honestly consider the repercussion of violence on a global level...

[Seven · Rating 4 out of 5]

i am loving this book. got a chance to meet the author. wonder full spirit.

[Lesley · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was hit or miss for me. Some poems fell kind of flat for me while others were simply beautiful. Worth it!

[Joseph Ross]

Beautiful images.

[Jane · Rating 4 out of 5]

at times hard to get through, but powerful

[Laurie Rigler · Rating 5 out of 5]

Chris Abani is a masterful writer. I can open to any page and find something inspiring, moving, and beautiful.

[Isla McKetta · Rating 4 out of 5]

Although I found the third part of this book the most beautiful, it was the second part that haunted my dreams and inspired me to write.

[Giselle · Rating 5 out of 5]

2016 ends on a good note, the poetry of Chris Abani has been a wonderful discovery!!

[Naomi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Poetry for reflection. Some will bring forth a wry smile, others tears.