Abdulrazaq Salihu, TPC I, is a Nigerian writer and performance poet. A member of the Hill-Top Creative Arts Foundation, he has received residency from IWE Nigeria, The Frances Thompson Writers Studio, and is a 2025 Fellow at the LOATAD Black Atlantis. He won the Masks Literary Magazine Poetry Award, LAP Performance Poetry Prize, SOD, BKPW, and Poetry Archive contest. He’s the author of Constellations and Hiccups and has his chapbook, Quantum Entanglements With Notes on Loss, forthcoming with Sundress Publication 2025. He has works published/forthcoming with Uncanny, Bacopa Mag, Strange Horizons, Stachion, Consequence, SofloPojo, Bracken, Poetry Quarterly and elsewhere. He tweets @Arazaqsalihu and instagram: abdulrazaq._salihu
Most of us might not have considered entries and exit in a poetic context, but one way or the other, if we’re writing poetry, we’ve used them.
The entry: opening line or sentence of the poem.
The exit: closing line or sentence of the poem.
These two lines might feel simple or obvious, but they hold as much importance in a poem as a door holds in the purpose of a house.