WHISPERS OF MY SOUL

About the Book

I was born and raised in a tiny village on the south coast of Haiti, called Roche-a-Bateau (French for rock as a boat), so named due to a large rock, shaped as a boat, and adorned with plush green vegetation in the middle of the ocean, a few miles before the location of my actual birth town. I was immensely blessed to live my youngest years really close to nature: the ocean, mountains, rivers, sunrises and sunsets, moonrises and moonsets, native animals, trees, flowers, medicinal plants and others, and courageous, faith-filled, joyous folks. Hence, poetry has been the music of my soul as I dance through the peaks and valleys of my life. Though unexpressed for almost fifty years, it is now flowing out abundantly for me to enjoy and share here with the world. And for this precious gift, I am deeply grateful. I write on a variety of topics and themes, about whomever or whatever tickles my soul.

About the Author

I was born and raised in a tiny village on the south coast of Haiti, called Roche-a-Bateau (French for rock as a boat), so named due to a large rock, shaped as a boat, and adorned with plush green vegetation in the middle of the ocean, a few miles before the location of my actual birth town, Roche-a-Bateau. I was immensely blessed to live my youngest years really close to nature: the ocean, mountains, rivers, sunrises and sunsets, moonrises and moonsets, native animals, trees, flowers, medicinal plants and others, and courageous, faith-filled, joyous folks. Hence, poetry has been the music of my soul as I dance through the peaks and valleys of my life. Though unexpressed for almost fifty years, it is now flowing out abundantly for me to enjoy and share here with the world. And for this precious gift, I am deeply grateful. I write on a variety of topics and themes, about whomever or whatever tickles my soul. I completed my elementary and secondary education in my native Haiti, earned a teacher’s certification, experienced five years as a nun in the convent of the Canadian Order of the Missionaries of the Immaculate Conception. Before I entered the convent, while I was there, and a year after I left, I taught elementary education for a total of seven years. In October 1983, I moved to the United States, joining my second older brother, living then in Dorchester, MA. As a new immigrant in this country, for the first year, I learned English mainly with PBS “Sesame Street” TV program, and through books, writing letters to imaginary friends in English, noting new words in my constant notebook companion while on the bus, at work, at the Post Office, or department stores, and taking English classes. That first year, I worked as housekeeper aid in various nursing homes in Massachusetts, then assisting the elderly in their homes, as a home health aid. As I became more proficient in the English language, I worked three years as an administrative assistant in a Catholic school in Dorchester, MA, ten years as an ESOL teacher/counselor/community liaison at The Community Learning Center in Cambridge, MA. While working in the latter position, I felt a deep yearning for something more, a different career. So, I decided to resume academic study, earned a Master’s Degree in Marriage and Family Therapy from Cambridge College, Cambridge, MA, and obtained my national license as a Marriage & Family Therapist in Massachusetts two years later. Growing weary of the cold climate in that northern state, having divorced from my short-lived marriage to my then Jewish American husband, I relocated in tropical South Florida. There, I fulfilled the requirements of the Professional Licensing Board of Florida and re-earned my license as a Marriage & Family Therapist--since the State of Florida does not honor some licenses earned in other states. After a few more local changes in residence, I presently live in the beautiful city of Hollywood, FL, and have been working in the Substance Addiction Treatment field for over seven years. Here, I continue to enjoy nature, particularly the ocean, as much as, or perhaps more than I did growing up in my native Haiti.