It launched a profound, revolutionary act of post-colonial imagination and technological defiance that transcends its status as a mere Cold War footnote.
In a global context dominated by the American and Soviet technological duopoly, Nkoloso, a former freedom fighter, executed a masterstroke of political performance. His mission - featuring 17-year-old Matha Mwamba, twelve Afronauts, two cats, and a missionary - sought to beat the world powers to Mars using a homemade rocket (the D-Kalu) and unconventional, grassroots training methods.
Nkoloso asserted that the colonial powers were too consumed by war and exploitation to truly deserve the heavens. His demand for space access was not as a supplicant, but as an independent, non-aligned nation, asserting a sovereign right to the cosmos.
The project was simultaneously a sophisticated satire of the Global North’s technological hubris and a deadly serious statement about African technological autonomy.
The Africa Migration Report Poetry Anthology Series invite poets to engage with the full philosophical, emotional, political, and speculative dimensions of the Afronauts' mission and its enduring legacy, examining how this defiant dream continues to inform African and Diasporic futures.
We seek work that uses the lyric, narrative, and experimental tools of poetry to capture the tension between scrap metal and celestial ambition.
Submission Guidelines
- Poems should be 40 lines or less, and short prose, 100 words or less.
- Submissions must be in English. In the case of translated work, it is the translator’s responsibility to obtain permission from the copyright holder of the original work.
- If submitting a poem or short prose that has been previously published, please give details of where it has appeared and confirm that you are the copyright holder.
- Submissions should be typed single spaced and submitted either in the body of an email or as a .doc attachment.
- Please include a short biography of 50 words or less. This will be included in the anthology if your poem is accepted.
- You may submit a maximum of three poems or three pieces of short prose or a combination of poems and short fiction. You do not have to submit all three at the same time.
- We welcome submissions from writers of all ages, based anywhere in the world.
- Please send the poems and short fiction to: <forcedmigrationandthearts@gmail.com>
- Deadline: 12 noon, Monday, 25 May 2026, Africa Day.
Thematic Prompts for Poetic Exploration
We encourage poets to use the following five thematic clusters, which explore the programme's deep context, political dimensions, and lasting significance, as springboards for new work.
I. The Zambian Dream: Materiality, Character, and Training
This cluster focuses on the immediate, tangible reality of the programme - the people, the materials, the practice, and the dreams they embodied against staggering odds.
The Unconventional Crew: Center your work on Matha Mwamba, the only female Afronaut, or the lesser-known trainees. What was the psychological cost of holding such a radical, utopian hope in a newly independent nation? Explore the internal conflicts, hopes, and doubts amidst the makeshift training and international scrutiny. We seek poems that provide inner lives for these historical figures.
The Menagerie of Mission: Analyze the potent symbolism of the two cats and the inclusion of the missionary in the training regimen. How does this juxtaposition of scientific ambition, the animal world, and colonial religious authority create conflict, friction, or new, syncretic meanings? Consider the missionary's unique perspective - was it of skepticism, spiritual endorsement, or silent political resistance against the new government?
Artifacts of Aspiration: Focus intensely on the tangible objects: the oil drum and rope swing (the training simulator), the D-Kalu rocket made of scrap metal, and the improvised spacesuits. The transformation of scrap metal into a space vehicle is a philosophical statement. Explore the labor, ingenuity, and cultural meaning embedded in these artifacts.
The Methodology of Decolonization: Explore the training itself. How did using localized, available materials and non-elite methods articulate a rejection of Western technological dominance? Consider the political theatre of demonstrating technological competence using limited, local resources.
Failure as Futurity: Create a work that argues the project’s inability to launch was, in fact, its most powerful success. How does a defiant failure open up more possibilities than a compromised technical achievement would have?
II. The Global Gaze: Satire, Politics, and Celestial Claims
This cluster deals with the geopolitical reality, the international reaction, and the ethical claims Nkoloso made on the future of space.
Heavenly Competition: Examine the philosophical and religious dimensions of Nkoloso's claim on Mars and the Moon. What did it mean to assert sovereignty over celestial bodies for a newly independent African nation, symbolically reversing the historical logic of terrestrial colonialism and imperialistic discovery?
The Global Laughter and Local Pride: Explore the vicious cycle of the international media's reception (often mocking or patronizing) and how that contrasted with the program’s powerful domestic effect on Zambian national pride and internal political debate. When does satire function as a weapon of the powerful, and when does it become a tool of ingenious resistance for the marginalized?
Ethics of the Unconquered: Detail the ethical framework Nkoloso proposed for the Afronauts—a mission explicitly intended to avoid violence and spread goodwill. How does this ethos critique the history of resource exploitation and territorial claims on Earth, and what are the implications for international space law?
Political Independence as Launchpad: How did the specific moment of political independence in 1964 provide the necessary ideological fuel for such a bold, utopian technological assertion, and how did it affect Zambia's non-aligned status?
Subverting Technological Whiteness: Produce a piece that explores how Nkoloso's project subverted the notion of technological whiteness, the idea that advanced technology is the sole province of the Global North—by performing competence with unconventional means.
III. Future Vectors: Diaspora, History, and Technological Sovereignty
This cluster connects the Afronauts’ micro-history to broader Pan-Africanism, global military history, and the future of African scientific contributions.
The Pan-African Future: Connect Nkoloso's cosmic aspirations to the larger Pan-African movements of the 1960s. How did the demand for technological inclusion and sovereignty resonate and facilitate knowledge exchange across the continent and throughout the African diaspora?
The Shadow of War: Reflect on the legacy of WW2 and the V-2 rocket program. How did the history of global conflict and subsequent Cold War technologies influence post-colonial nations, and how did Nkoloso’s grassroots approach serve as a critique or alternative to that military-industrial lineage?
Contemporary Contributions: Explore the stories of Africans and the African diaspora who went on to contribute to global space programmes and research. Center figures like the mathematical pioneers known as the "Hidden Figures" of NASA (e.g., Katherine Johnson, Dorothy Vaughan, Mary Jackson), astronauts such as Dr. Mae C. Jemison (first African American woman in space) and Leland Melvin, or leaders in contemporary African space agencies (e.g., SANSA or NASRDA). How do their achievements intersect with, diverge from, or fulfill Nkoloso’s original, defiant vision?
Challenging the Narrative: Create a work that challenges the conventional narrative of the Space Race by centering an African voice or perspective, reframing the accepted timeline of cosmic ambition.
Digital Diasporic Spaces: How does Nkoloso’s story live on in digital diasporic spaces (social media, memes, digital art)? Explore the transformation of this historical moment into a contemporary, transnational source of cultural power.
IV. Legacies: Planetary Justice, Extraction, and Environmental Cost
This cluster delves into the lasting legacies, the ethical cost of space technology, and the theme of freedom of movement in the age of global borders.
Global Extraction and Space Technologies: Create work that explores the essential, often hidden, connection between space hardware and the African resources (coltan, lithium, rare earth elements) needed to build them. Focus on the human and environmental cost of cosmic ambition on the continent, particularly on the affected people near mining activities. Consider specific resource-rich nations like The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) for cobalt/coltan, Zimbabwe, and South Africa. Detail the resulting ecological damage.
Celestial Waste and Debris: Explore the ethical crisis of space debris and celestial waste that disproportionately falls over the African continent. Launch trajectories allow debris to impact regions across the Atlantic, Indian Ocean, and nations near the equator (including parts of West, Central, and East Africa). How does this technological waste reflect a continuation of colonial power dynamics? Investigate the legal difficulty for affected nations to claim compensation.
The Cosmic Escape: Contrast the utopian promise of space travel with the terrestrial reality of restricted freedom of movement for Africans (migration, visas, border regimes, and refugee crises). Focus on specific sites of restriction, such as the dangerous Mediterranean crossing, detention centers in North Africa (e.g., Libya), or the internal border controls in regions like the Sahel and along South Africa's borders. Critically examine how European financial support actively bankrolls the security measures and externalized border control initiatives that restrict African mobility, and explore the highly varied ways the Global North is responding to the resulting crises (e.g., humanitarian critique versus securitization policies). Is space the ultimate, unfettered escape, or does it simply replicate and expand terrestrial injustices? We specifically welcome poems that interrogate the contrast between cosmic and terrestrial mobility.
The Power of (Im)mobility: Use the theme of (im)mobility to create a contrast between those who have the freedom to move (or launch into space) and those whose movement is restricted by post-colonial borders.
Planetary Justice: Produce a work that directly links the terrestrial issues of resource extraction, the dumping of space debris, and the restriction of human migration into a comprehensive demand for Planetary Justice.
V. The Enduring Afterlife: Temporality, Mythology, and Futures
This final cluster focuses on the power of Nkoloso's story to transcend historical fact and enter the realm of mythology, Afrofuturism, and enduring cultural resonance.
The Projection of 2074: Nkoloso launched the Zambian Space Programme in October 1964. Travel 110 years into the future to the year 2074. Write a story, play, or visual concept set in that year. What has Africa achieved by then? How does this temporal leap function as a way to displace present anxiety with long-term vision, connecting Nkoloso’s dream to established Afrofuturist literary precedents (e.g., Sun Ra, Octavia Butler)?
Media Afterlife, Archives, and Source Material (Including Oral History): We invite critical and creative explorations of the primary and secondary sources that define the Afronauts’ story, especially focusing on oral history interviews and personal testimonies. Analyze how this history has been constructed across various media and popular culture sites, including: literary works (e.g., the novel The Old Drift by Namwali Serpell, the play The Afronauts by Tonderai Munyevu, existing poetry, and academic monographs), newsreel footage, original newspaper reports (like Nkoloso's "Open Letter to UNESCO"), contemporary songs, music videos (e.g., Muzi, Janelle Monáe), films (e.g., Afronauts by Nuotama Bodam), speculative art installations (e.g., Cristina de Middel), and academic work. How does engaging directly with primary sources, such as Matha Mwamba's testimony, records from the National Archives of Zambia, or contemporary oral accounts from community members, challenge or confirm the project’s popular mythos and reveal the lived experience of the time? Create new work that excavates and reclaims the narrative from these source materials.
The Legacy of the Laugh: Analyse the success of the project not as a scientific achievement, but as a cultural one. If the world laughed, what did that laughter reveal about the world, and how did Nkoloso use that laughter as a shield or a weapon? Explore the notion of failure as resistance.
Celestial Narratives: Explore how African and African diasporic myths, legends, folklore, cosmologies, and beliefs about space and space travel provide an enduring foundation for understanding the cosmos. We specifically invite work engaging with traditions like Dogon cosmology and the Sirius star system, Yoruba Orisha narratives related to creation, and other beliefs that feature celestial beings or cosmic journeys. How do these narratives interact with Nkoloso’s secular-yet-spiritual mission?
The
Non-Linear Event: Create a work that treats the Zambian Space Programme not as a historical event that failed, but as a non-linear, ongoing cosmic event that is still happening outside of conventional, Western chronology.
About The Poetry Anthology Series
The Africa Migration Report Poetry Anthology Series is a multi-volume poetry project exploring themes of African and African diasporic migration. Inspired by the Africa Migration Report: 2nd Edition (African Union and International Organisation for Migration, 2024).
The poetry anthology series is organized by Forced Migration and The Arts, CivicLeicester, and Regularise. Books we have been published as part of the series include the collection, Japa Fire: An Anthology of Poems on African and African Diasporic Migration (2024), and From Here To There: 101 Poems on African and African Diasporic Migration (CivicLeicester, Forthcoming).
See also, our concept note, videos from readings and conversations around the series, and our appeal for funding.
Image credit: "Afronauts", by Korrine Sky
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