Uche Ogbuji

Uche Ogbuji, more properly Úchèńnà Ogbújí, was born in Calabar, Nigeria and raised in a stew of cultures, on three continents. Secondary school for him, a boarding school in the heart of Igbo country, became an exercise in getting properly and forcefully steeped in his paternal ancestry. University, at Nsukka, the hallowed institution of the likes of Chinua Achebe and Christopher Okigbo, was supposed to be where he got his engineering degree, but was instead where he fell in love with poetry and spoken word performance.
He now lives in Boulder, Colorado and works in software by day but also writes and performs as much as he can. His chapbook, Ndewo, Colorado (Aldrich Press) is a Colorado Book Award Winner, and a Westword Award Winner (“Best Environmental Poetry”). His debut full-length collection, Ńchéfù Road (2022) is winner of the Christopher Smart Prize. His work taps into Igbo culture, European classicism, American Mountain West setting, and Hip-Hop, and featured in