Ceremony for the Nameless

Exploring naming and its power, the remarkable second collection from the award-winning poet and former Young People-s Laureate for London

In Yoruba culture, newborn babies are welcomed into the world, and ushered into the social fabric, through naming ceremonies filled with songs of praise. The names bestowed are communicative both of where the baby has come from - the circumstances of its birth, the atmosphere in the home - and of where its future will take it. Both are forms of destiny.

Far-reaching and musical, Theresa Lola-s second collection explores the act of naming and its role in shaping our identities, our aspirations, what we carry and how we belong. Lola conjures and questions the realities of her dual Nigerian-British identity; traces the lineages of names; asks why some deserve to be named while others are treated as though invisible; and explores the ways our journey through life might require us to cast off old expectations - both others- and ou