Qwantu Amaru(the light bringer) is a current resident of Sao Paulo, Brazil and a beauty mark on the world’s expansive face. born in pittsburgh, pennsylvania he has traveled the u.s. extensively and spent considerable time abroad as well.
he wrote his first poem back in ’98 about a love battle waged and lost and he’s been using poetry to battle back ever since. complex and ever changing his writing took a significant leap forward upon joining the diverse and hard hitting backtalk! poetry troupe in 2001. somewhere between honing his craft as a passionate spoken word artist and attending florida a&m in the mba program he managed to graduate and someone actually hired this self described “conscious rebelâ€.
“we used to work for the massa, now i’ve got my masters, and i still work for the massa,†he says of his experience working the commercial plantations of corporate america. not letting anything stop him, qwantu continues to evolve working by day as a business unit director for a multibillion dollar pharmaceutical company and is in process of trying to find a publisher and literary agent for his recently completed novel of speculative fiction while writing his second novel. He has also completed five chapbooks of spoken word and page poetry.
Qwantu’s primary writing influences are Langston Hughes, Richard Wright, Tananarive Due, Alex Hailey, Wilbur Smith and Stephen King among many others. He describes his spoken word flow as “stream of consciousness poetic truthâ€. be on the lookout for Qwantu in a town near you!