I know exactly when and where I am the first time my sister tells me she is pregnant. It is snowing outside, and I am barefoot in my apartment in Fairfax, watching flakes press against the window. I am one year into my MFA in Creative Writing, far along enough to sound like I belong when I say things in class like “So… is the mother a metaphor? or “The dog feels symbolic, but I’m not sure of what.”, but not so far along that I didn’t flinch when people ask me what home means (which, by the way, I’ve learnt is a very popular question in creative settings).

In a poem by Jimale Ali Ahmed entitled “Portraiture” in his collection When Donkeys Give Birth to Calves (2012), a professor-persona warns his students “to beware of / Language: potent force that can manhandle us”. The Oxford English Dictionary renders the verb ‘manhandle’ thus: To attack an enemy; to handle roughly; to assault, maul, or beat up. In this essay, Kahyana reflects on how a Ugandan poet, academic and politician, Dr Stella Nyanzi, uses her writing to ‘manhandle’ Uganda’s long-ruling President, General Yoweri Kaguta Museveni (in power since January 1986) by portraying him in several metaphorical albeit irreverent ways.

Upstart Crow is a literary podcast affiliated with Watershed Lit Radio. We recently got the chance to interview the hosts, William Miller, Ken Budd, and Jennifer Disano.