Dambu Lui Gaf

David Smalling

I have been writing poems since I was 12 years; but writing had been my blanket for loneliness since age 11. My father died when I was 13 and poetry was my therapy for pain since then. Only I wanted the world to think, feel, laugh, but not cry. I had been forgotten in the grief of my father's death because everyone else needed the consolation I did not get. I became the even more the withdrawn loner, and saw a world more aggressively hostile. Books became my better friend and drove me deeper into academic seclusion. I wrote thousands of poems everywhere: on rocks, trees, sand, and all over house and school - this was how I interrogate the world, and how I weep alone. Poetry was my quest and comfort. I trusted paper and pen and spoke my truths to them above all else. Yes, I am graduate, a business major, a science major, an humanities major ... still searching for consolation, love, security, and joy obtained in poetry. Then again Jamaica is such an ideal place to live as a poet; the history and memories, juxtaposed against the world, is pure inspiration. more…

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