𝔓𝔯𝔢-𝔒𝔯𝔡𝔢𝔯 ✻ The Goat’s Tongue

do not speak as humans do.
speak like a poet.

Winner of The International Metatron Poetry Prize

The Goat’s Tongue is an interdisciplinary poetry collection that follows a girl, a goat, and an owl through the landscapes of vulnerability, belonging, memory, rejection, and forgiveness.

Rooted in Yoruba oral literature and born from Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye’s durational performance work Ori. Ara. Emi. (Ori. Ori. My Head), the collection moves between English and a symbolic language created by the author. Through poetry, folklore, performance, and visual script, Akintade-Oluwagbeye transforms a childhood memory of silence, dirt, goats, and isolation into a mythic inquiry into what it means to speak, to remember, and to become human.

Haunting, tender, and formally inventive, The Goat’s Tongue is a work of ancestral imagination and embodied poetics — a book about the hunger to belong, the pain of rejection, and the strange, sacred work of finding a voice.

Rooted in childhood memory, ancestral knowledge, and postcolonial questions of isolation and communication, The Goat’s Tongue bridges oral literature and the contemporary page, offering a haunting, intimate, and formally inventive work about the struggle to speak, the hunger for belonging, and the transformative power of poetry.

Advance Praise

“This book is beyond brilliant, it’s the constant time out of time it embraces, creating a weirdly free cannibalization of language, so feral and hungry I was compelled and captivated, wielding memory and love, unmaking and making the self, a vortex of magical joy.”

— Precious Okoyomon

author of But Did You Die?

“This book is unlike anything I’ve read before. Even on a second read, it’s a truly unique experience. Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye has developed a new system of symbolic language that evolves in step with her curious and exploratory poetics. The world of The Goat’s Tongue unfolds like a flower, revealing depths of perspective that captivate and enchant. At once a fable, a bildungsroman, and a linguistic treatise, this collection is a testament to a self-assured artist with an open heart and a silver tongue.”

— Alasdair Rees

author of mon écologie

“The Goat’s Tongue is not simply read—it is entered, embodied, consumed with a necessary hunger. Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye not only builds a living archive through these poems: of the self, of memory, of lineage, but digs deeply into the context of (b)lack poetics with a full-throated yet meditative vigor. With this work, Akintade-Oluwagbeye cements herself as one of Saskatchewan’s leading Black/Queer artists; a distinction that will be felt within the province’s cultural fabric for decades to come.”

— Miguel A. Fenrich

Blue: A Novel and What Lies in the Valley

“Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye’s poetry is enigmatic and energizing; it bites with its gentleness, caresses with its rage, and soothes with its urgency. Inexplicable and extraordinary.”

— Khodi Dill

spoken word artist, author of stay up: racism, resistance, and reclaiming Black freedom

“The Goat’s Tongue is a beautiful collection that feels both intimate and expansive. Each poem arrives like a clear note—precise, musical, unforgettable. I found myself returning to lines, hearing them echo in ordinary moments: at the bus stop, in the kitchen, on late-night walks. This is poetry that listens as much as it speaks, and it will stay with you long after the last page.”

— Gabriel ‘ArchAngel’ Ehijie

interdisciplinary artist and author of Dunes From The Sahara

“Peace Akintade weaves poetry, symbols, and story into a language that moves beyond words. Her work lives in the same space as dance—where meaning is felt as much as it is understood. Through glyphs and lyrical text, she crafts an embodied narrative of voice and silence, longing and transformation. As a past collaborator, I recognize this as her gift: creating worlds where the un-speakable finds form, and where poetry is carried out not just on the page, but through interdisciplinary storytelling.”

— Jackie Latendresse

Artistic Director of Free Flow Dance Theatre

“Peace is one of those one-in-a-generation artists that you feel lucky to encounter. The Goat’s Tongue is no exception, showcasing Akintade-Oluwagbeye’s powerful storytelling and transporting you to another world — visceral, evocative, imaginative.”

— S.E. Grumms

Co-creator of SCUM: a manifesto, Girl in the Box, Something In The Water and Creepy Boys with So.Glad Arts

“Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye builds a language, a vocabulary, a world, with a grace and deftness that feels like this is the only way those words could have fallen. The precision and clarity of the book’s direction and craft demonstrate the richness of all these soil-grown visions.”

— Dash Reimer

poet + musician, formerly Saskatchewan’s 5th Youth Poet Laureate

Peace Akintade

Peace Akintade – Oluwagbeye, the 11th Saskatchewan Poet Laureate, is an African-Canadian interdisciplinary poet, oral historian, and choruspoem playwright residing in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. Organically from Yorubaland Nigeria, her work knits together folklore, abstract riddles, and Òwé Yorùbá elements of poetry to create a collective oneself.

Author of Earth Skin (2024), Equanimity in Sonder, Equanimity in Conversation and The Taste of Sonder (2025). Poetry-plays include Madness with Rocks (Obsidian Theatre, Playwrights Canada Press), Painted Elephant (Black Theatre Workshop), I who I am, and First Let Me Breathe (Theatre on the Beat). Recipient of the 2022 RBC SaskArts Emerging Artist Award and the 2023 Platinum Jubilee Queen’s Medal. 2020-2021 Saskatchewan Youth Poet Laureate, 2022 and 2023 READSaskatoon Poet Laureate.

A lover of humanity and humans, Peace can be found writing in scrolls, talking to pigeons, organizing focus groups, festivals, and poetry workshops in Canada. Her goal is to introduce the power of traditional African (Yoruba) oral literature, storytelling, and performance art to the growing public of Saskatchewan and beyond.