Language Play in The Razor Wire of Exile
- ella1525
- May 31
- 8 min read
Language Play & An Outsider
By Bridgette James
In every poem featured in this anthology, the writer has toyed with English; a global language which historically has been used to disempower ‘othered’ language communities such as ones in the African continent.
In the winning poem: ‘The Etymology of Homesickness,’ as well as being pivoted into the world of Janine Milne’s changeling protagonist, the reader is confronted with Milne’s attempt at redefining homesickness.
Milne’s indulgence in language play in her poem is akin to Fiona Larkin in her 2024 National Poetry Competition winning entry: ‘Absence has a grammar.’ While Larkin examines the abessive case in Finnish, Milne teaches the reader words English language supposedly borrowed from Greek. Milne additionally relies on the definitions of unfamiliar words like Gyre (an ocean’s current driven by wind) and unspool (to unwind from a thread’s cylindrical spool) to inject ‘linguistic depths’ into her writing. As the poem unravels itself, I became increasingly intrigued by how it further explores what the poet calls an etymology of homesickness, and the novel way the poet uses lexical items to write about displacement and ostracization.
The coinage: returning-home pain premises an interesting concept. How does one learn about its symptoms when the ailment being referenced in the stanza is no longer listed in medical textbooks? This is even more worrying because homesickness in the poet’s universe, could kill people.
The poem climaxes with the poet — a flawed protagonist— searching for cures to heal the pain rejection causes, which I assume might have helped the soldiers mentioned in the poem as well. Give me my opium, leeches, / my warm, hypnotic powders / to cure me of the look in your eyes /that says, ‘I don’t love you anymore.’
Which English-speaking migrant cannot relate to being questioned or teased about their accent? An African migrant speaking on the phone to loved ones back home might sound different; equally a foreign accent alienates one in countries they emigrate to: Strangers to their native tongue, / betrayed by inchoate longings, /like an accent no one can place.
‘Raw/Rou’ sent in by Yuwinn A. Kraukamp, is a visually stunning piece that uses language to debate about one’s identity. I gravitated like an archaeologist discovering an artifact, towards the phrases in Afrikaans because it is a language I was unfamiliar with — but which after watching YouTube videos, I have now come to love.
The section about a grieving rawmother (a coinage) left me overwhelmed. This poet has such good linguistic flair. There are so many memorable lines, I do not know which I love the most; I still struggle to spell God’s true name without autocorrection perhaps?
Central to’ Raw/Rou’ is the question of the hierarchy of language. Due to economic, cultural, and historic factors, are languages like English seen as superior to African languages such as Afrikaans, Swahili, Yoruba, Igbo et cetera?
On a side note, according to Wikipedia[1], as many as four South African languages have been declared extinct. Where there are no native speakers, a dialect dies.
What is a pre-colonial vernacular? I see this as a form of resistance to European domination. I like how Kraukamp switches between English and Afrikaans. I’m again reminded of the 2024 National Poetry Competition winner, Fiona Larkin’s poem: ‘Absence has a Grammar.’
The duality of meaning of some words in ‘Raw/Rou’ underscores the poet’s dual identity. Can they be both pale and African too?
A reader might burst out laughing at Kraukamp’s claim that they only know swear words in English. But I know all the white words: fuck /Fuckup. Freakshow. Failure. The use of fuck might be an allusion to British English. I read online that Brits are considered foul-mouthed and some of the world’s most prolific swearers. I found it consoling however reading that Americans use profanities too. On a more serious note, however in ‘Raw/Rou’ is English/language being used by an unnamed argumentative character to degrade the poet?
Those lines almost tripped me over due to the alliteration of the voiceless labiodental fricative /f/. Language play in this collection, also involves playing with phonemes not just morphemes, prefixes or suffixes.
The use of varying alignment in ‘Raw/Rou’ works even though we read from left to right in English. We get the impression a conversation is going on between speakers or at different periods of time because some stanzas are on the right hand of the page, while some are on the left. The mixture of long, short and enjambed lines to build tension and slow down the pace in the poem, may also count as features of ‘language play.’
And in each one, we’re speaking two different languages
Two voices, reciting two different poems
In Milne’s poem, the imagery-laden phrase: the razor wire of exile —which ordinarily would refer to the use of barbed wire for warfare as in World War 1[2]—brings to mind state-sponsored measures such as the deployment of barbed wire by US Marines, at the Mexican-American border in January 2025, [3]to deter migrants crossing into the United States. Who belongs where and who is deemed an outsider?
In The Cambridge Introduction to Creative writing,[4] Professor David Morley says: ‘Writing is somewhat of a confessional business. A good way to get to know a writer is by reading their work.’
Milne, runner-up Oyedeji, Kraukamp (placed third), and a number of poets in the annual competition, tapped into their lived experiences and perceptions of their social realities in order to inform their writing. When prompted to write about what makes them an outsider, most poets used shocking language to tell their innermost secrets. A fly on the wall, I heard revelations about people’s sexual orientation, health conditions and issues that cause internal conflicts.
To paraphrase the words of Maggie Nelson spoken in a 2026 Poetry Foundation Podcast, every writer starts off against the world’s indifference and that gives the writer the oomph to say, I’m going to take up space with my writing. In the best competition entries this year writers chose subjects which enabled then to pit themselves against the world while playfully engaging language to discuss the profound theme: outsider.
I was so captivated by ‘Margins’ because of how the poet tackled the theme: Outsider, I read the poem dozens of times. How originally imaginative is it? We go inside a woman’s anatomy and inside a Magnetic Resonance Imaging/MRI machine. I’m claustrophobic so liked how this poem makes the hairs on my head stand on ends.
Damilola Oyedeji utilises language play to intentionally manipulate words, sounds, and grammatical rules to produce humour, wit, and unusual aesthetic effects. A display of technical skill sees her repurposing the definitions of margin. In her ‘language-play poem’ she separates the adjective every from the common noun: body, to mean each person’s anatomy. This universal poem is for everyone suffering from a lifelong condition.
There is a multiplicity of meanings attributed to the word blue in the poem. It changes in every stanza from stanza 6, onwards. I like how the poet taps into shared knowledge: we know medics wear navy blue. Is that why the narrator keeps seeing blue?
I. Blue = excessive
II. Blue = every voice the poet hears
III. Blue = everybody is blue
IV. Blue – hands hiding their bodies
V. Blue = mouths biting others blue
VI. Blue – hurting
Margins demarcate; consequently, some people are excluded from society. Who’s in the pond and who’s out of it? Again, I find myself drifting back to Milne’s razor wire of exile. I am nudged back to Oyedeji’s work with a reminder that the adjective marginalised is cleverly absent in her poem but yet I can’t stop thinking about marginalised communities.
I want to use the term: poesis to describe how the poem: ‘Margins’ builds a new thing. Poesis is a Greek word meaning ‘making.’ Here in a dream state, the poet creates something that did not exist before - a world where everything is blue. It’s like a horror sci-fi really.
In terms of its structure, it is a visually-appealing poem. Lines reduce in length as the poem tapers to a close.
I learnt that mankind is blue…was she hallucinating? I asked myself while reading it. Was she under anaesthetic?
We move into first world fantasy seamlessly. In a world so obsessed with skin colour, it’s refreshing to know we are all blue inside. Are you normal or are you acting? A lot of fat-shaming going on in the story. Who hasn’t been there? I remember my mum walking into a packed room seventeen years ago - not long after I’d given birth to my son- and gushing out: Are you happy your stomach’s so big?
While I mostly laughed reading this, the first time I become quite tearful reading about the narrator’s experience of an MRI scan. With each read, I feel the poet’s anxiety even more, because of how she has employed good tactical imagery. Diagnostic tests are always anxiety-provoking. I gather from the poem that she has a familial history of reproductive issues. All womankind would relate to issues raised.
Oyedeji’s hook line: Everything outside my body is excessive, is a compelling, intriguing opening that immediately grabs the reader's attention. I find myself thinking: Damn. Why did I give up my gym membership again? Why are my potion sizes so large?
The poem feels complete, with one "line" of thought about the theme of weight gain and (perhaps perceived) related health consequences.
Oyedeji’s subject matter is one a lot of females would relate to. Recently there has been a shift in the paradigm from socioeconomic issues that make good food unaffordable. Instead, political discourse about health-related issues that cause weight gain, especially in America puts a socially-constructed, irresponsible citizen under the radar. On the surface the focus seems to be on bad diets,[5] but on closer inspection, outsiders/citizens suffering from obesity are now being blamed by right-leaning governments for sedentary lifestyles and laziness, that promote obesity. A person with underlying health conditions is now made to feel solely responsible for their body size. In ‘Margins’ the protagonist presents an entire world that is made of up judgemental outsiders, looking at her (a female); [w]hat is the naming of a body set outside the margin? We can almost hear those derogatory names.
Finally, all the writers in this collection have used linguistic precision to create exact and resonant pictures of their reality because Chimamanda Ngoze Adichie[6] has reminded African writers to tell their own stories. (Your story can be told through a poem.) And after reading hundreds of entries telling compelling tales this year, some great lines resonated with me. Please allow me to share them with yourself:
1. Once, they knew homesickness — The Etymology of Homesickness
2. Growing up in a little town, post-apartheid, you tend to see things. — ‘Horseback’
3. Oredia is a defector — ‘The Priest's Litany’
4. Before I knew myself, the world knew me — ‘Theophany.’
5. i am the ghost of my father’s pride — ‘Queer.’
6. I arrive carrying a passport that does not remember me — ‘Beloved Country’
7. Everything outside my body is excessive — ‘Margins’
8. Seven percent of the people in my land look like me — ‘What Privilege’
9. The sitting room rearranges itself around my father — ‘This Goliath was a Victim.’
10. This body. spacious. Empty — ‘Stranger Danger.’
Reference List:
1. Wikipedia (2026) ‘List of Extinct Languages. [Online][List of extinct languages of Africa - Wikipedia]Accessed May 15, 2026.
2. Wikipedia (2026) ‘Razor Wire [Online] Razor wire - Wikipedia Accessed May 19, 2026.
3. San Diago News [Online] Published February 1, 2025, [https://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/local/marines-us-mexico-border-fence-san-diego/3741373] Accessed May 15, 2026.
4. Morley D. (2007) The Cambridge Introduction to Creative Writing published by Cambridge University Press.
5. Nelson M. (May 6, 2026): Wake, Butterfly: Here Is What I Did with My Body in The Poetry Magazine Podcast published by Poetry Foundation.
6. US Department of Health and Human Services, (2026) ‘RFK Jr.: I’m fighting chronic disease, slashing unhealthy fat at HHS- [Online] https://www.hhs.gov/press-room/ny-post-kennedy-op-ed-slashing-unhealthy-fat-hhs.html Accessed 17 May, 2026.
7. Adichie C. N (2009) "The Danger of a Single Story,” TED Talk broadcast by TED.com
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