Known as Collage, this poetic sister has been writing for twenty years. She has been presenting for the past ten years in Chicago and various cities and venues across the country from San Francisco to New York; from the deep South of New Orleans to the far North of Philly, she has opened or performed for Sonia Sanchez; Nikki Giovanni; the late Poet Laureate Gwendolyn Brooks; Saul Williams of the critically acclaimed film SLAM; Regi Gibson of the movie Love Jones; hip-hop mogul KRS-ONE; Erykah Badu; Amel Larrieux, JOE; jazz saxophonist Walter Beasley; The Last Poets; Def Jam Poets J. Ivy; Triple Blak, Malik Yusef, Jessica Care Moore and has graced the stage at the House of Blues Chicago, both vocally and poetically. Deborah has also performed at various colleges and universities including Jackson State University where she organized the 2002 Artist Exchange/Poetry Jam featuring all Def Poetry Jam artists.In 1999, she represented her alma mater, Jackson State University at the Walter Payton Memorial Service held at Chicago's Soldier Field. There she delivered an original piece in front of over 17,000 people honoring Walter "Sweetness" Payton. The program was televised both nationally and internationally. She has been published in Close-Up Magazine, Black Thought Newspaper and has received press from the Hartford Courant, The Chicago Weekly News, The Chicago Educator, Jackson Advocate, The Clarion Ledger, The Jackson Free Press,The Planet Weekly and The Delta Democrat and The Mississippi Link. She has appeared on public access television in Chicago and Mississippi; and radio stations in various cities, including Hot 97.7, V103 and WGCI. Deborah is known in the artist community for her soul stirring and thought-provoking poems that deal with matters of the spirit, the soul and relationships between men and women. She is best known for her poems entitled,The Heart Of A Woman, The Baptism, We Are One, and Beautiful. She has been named the spiritual, soul, sistah by her poetic peers and has maintained consistency with her writing by living the words that she pens.Although she is a true poet at heart, she remains grounded and conscious of the issues that face our young people in our communities. She gives back through her sorority, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated to young people in schools, community centers, detention centers and churches encouraging them to find their original voice in and through the arts.Deborah published her first volume of poetry in 2001 entitled, THE ATTIC: words from the top through her publishing company Writes of Passage Publishing Group. The work received great reviews by Nikki Giovanni, and Regi Gibson.Not only is she a poet, but also a scholar and is a candidate for her Ph.D. in Urban and Regional Planning at Jackson State University. Collage received her Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing-Poetry from Sarah Lawrence College in 2006. She currently lives and loves in New Jersey.
