Category Archives: Daily Musings

Kwame Dawes: “Turn to the alchemy of dub.”

April 22, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

Preamble:

“Love Affair with literature,” is an annually event hosted by the department of literatures in English at The University of the West Indies, Mona campus. The department invites a prominent writer to read works that speak to the topic, whichever way the writer interprets the theme. The invited writer this year was none other than Kwame Dawes, with laudable accolades, which anyone can get from the internet. I was asked to introduce him, and therefore, thought it would be a disservice to just read his biography since anyone could. Instead, I decided to personalize the introduction as I have known Kwame for over 20 years. Although not close, we have been engaging each other in one capacity or another. Also, I wanted to use his poems/word to introduce him; so here is my introduction of Kwame Dawes

“Turn to the alchemy of dub,” is, for me, an unforgettable line from Kwame Dawes’ poem Faith. Just that phrase alone tells us something essential about the poet we welcometonight.

To speak of dub as alchemy is to understand something profound about this Caribbean region we call home, and specially Jamaica. Dub music, born out of rhythm and experimentation, is indeed a kind of alchemy as it takes fragments such as sound, memory, slices of history, bass, and voice and transforms them into something larger, more grounding than their parts and that sits in the base of your stomach, well at least mine. Transformative.

When Dawes names dub alchemy, he shows us something about his own poetic imagination: a deep respect and understanding for Jamaican creativity, for Caribbean ingenuity, for what our people have made out of centuries of movement, struggle, invention, and survival.

The first time I met Kwame Dawes was when I was invited to Calabash International Literary Festival, after my collection Caribbean Passion, 2004 had been published by Peepal Tree Press. I remember a brief encounter a moment before my reading. One of the poems in the collection, “Bumbu Clat,” is about the cloth women used to use when they had their menses before pads. The title of the poem is said to be the worse Jamaican bad word, and just a few week before my reading, an artist was arrested for shouting the word out on stage. (Absurd, but colonial ideology still rules and bumbu clat and other such words were still on the legal books, and punishable). Nonetheless I was determined to read the poem and I did. However, I remember asking Kwame just before I went on stage, if I could be arrested for reading the poem, hence cursing a Jamaican bad word at a public event. Needless to say I didn’t get arrested.

But that was not my first contact with Dawes, I remember getting an email from him, requesting an interview for his anthology Talk Yuh Talk: Interviews with Anglophone Caribbean Poets, which was published in 2000. I remember him calling me to make plans for the interview.

Since then, I have watched his career unfold; a career that stretches across continents and institutions, across poetry and teaching, across publishing and cultural leadership.

His tag line is “the busiest man in literature,” which makes him my twin in this regard as I regard myself as the busiest woman in literature. We are both hard workers. Perhaps you don’t know that Kwame is the day name for a boy born on a Saturday in Ghana where almost every child has a day name. My day name is Ama. The nursery rhyme about children born on specific days says “ Saturday’s child works hard for his living, so Kwame’s success must be measured against his hard work.

But busyness alone does not define Kwame Dawes, who is a man with a clear mission to create space for others and to build platforms.

Dawes’s objective is to ensure that poetry does not live quietly on a shelf but circulates through communities and across borders.

In another of his poems, Stray Paths, Dawes writes:

“This is the desire I carry
the moment of being announced
followed by the golden silence
of my presence.”

I believe that those lines aptly describe Kwame Dawes who is both public and private at the same time. A man whose work travels everywhere, whose presence is felt across the literary world and yet who carries within himself that quiet interior space where the poet lives.

The place where ideas are constantly turning and where imagination never rests.

If there is one thing you should know about Kwame Dawes, it is this: He is always thinking, always imagining the next possibility for poetry.

And through that restless imagination he has created something remarkable, and has forged a path for himself and for others.

We see that mission in the co-founding of Calabash International Literary Festival, which has become one of the most important literary gatherings in the region.

We see it in the African Poetry Book Fund, which has opened doors for poets across Africa.

And we hope to see it continue to unfold through the Caribbean Poetry Book Series that bring Caribbean poetry more fully into the world’s literary conversation.

Because poetry, as Kwame understands it, must not only be written; it must be sustained, supported and given a platform to breathe.

Kwame Dawes shows us that poetry can be organized, nurtured, and even , dare I say it, monetized to build ecosystems where poetry can live and grow.

There is a stanza from Dawes’ poem, “Marked” that seems appropriate to conclude this introduction. Dawes says:

“The poet must weep
when he returns, his linen
garments brown with the blood
of promise, his feet sticky
with the spilled blood of despair.
A soh it go.”

“The poet must weep when he returns.”

Perhaps that is where we recognize ourselves most deeply.

Because to be a poet in this time and in this world is to carry both vision and grief.

As a poet, I weep every day for my island. I weep for my people. I weep for the world. I weep for a future where there will be less inequality, less gender-based violence, less child abuse.

But maybe, just maybe, “a soh it go,” will be said not as a throw away but as an affirmation.

Because poetry reminds us that another way of imagining the world is always possible, including supporting our cousins and nearest neighbours, Cuba

And that is why the work of poets matters. That is why the work of Kwame Dawes matters. He continues to turn again and again to the alchemy of dub, to the transformative power of language, rhythm, and imagination.

To launch his Poet laureateship this year he has continued and expanded the Edward Baugh Prize for adult writers from Portland, St. Thomas, Kingston and St Andrew; the Louise Bennett-Coverley Prize for adult writers from St. Catherine, Clarendon, Manchester, Trelawny, St. Ann and St. Mary; and the Michael Cooke Prize for adult writers from Hanover, St. James, Westmoreland and St. Elizabeth.

Kwame Dawes says, “For me as a poet and as the Poet Laureate, I see it as an opportunity to see what people are thinking, what they’re feeling, and how they’re writing those feelings. It is a way to promote part of our culture, the construction of a way of seeing the world through this creative mechanism.”

Brothers and Sisters, let’s welcome Kwame Dawes, Jamaica’s current Poet Laureate.

Daily Musings

The Fornicating Lizards

April 11, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

Excuse the preamble, but context is everything.

I live in rural Jamaica, where the air is alive, the soil is generous, and the house, my home, is apparently open to free accommodations by all manner of creatures. I love plants, and because I love plants, I have plants in every room, including the bathroom. Admittedly, my home is a lush and welcoming environment, a sanctuary, a botanical embrace especially for the myriad species in the environment.

It is also, I have come to understand, a lizard/Anole resort. No negotiating. No advance schedule notice or invitation.

There are many lizards. Anoles, mostly, quiet, watchful, generally well-behaved tenants, if one ignores their calling cards, those tiny black droppings that appear as if signed, sealed, and deliberately placed to test my patience. They live behind my art work on the walls, and I have many pictures, so naturally, they have many apartments.

We coexist. But coexistence requires boundaries. And I have made my boundaries clear. Repeatedly.

I speak to them. Yes, I do. I am in constant conversation with all living things. I have told the lizards, calmly and with authority: Stay out of my bedroom. Especially the croaking ones; I cannot abide that incessant, rubbery sound at night. And stay out of my kitchen. ost importantly: Stay off my table.

This is not unreasonable.

So imagine! Really, truly, truly imagine my consternation when I entered my kitchen and found not one, but two lizards engaged in full, unapologetic, midday fornication on my table.

On. My. Table.

At first, I saw only the male. A big brown fellow, rather bold, with little dots on his head, as if he had dressed up for the occasion. He was animated. Committed. I moved to shoo him away, already offended by his presence, when I realized… Oh no. This was not loitering. This was an event.

Beneath him, the female, small, half his size, likely minding her own business until he decided that my table was the appropriate venue for romance or a quickie!

Now, let me be clear: I do not object to their frolicking. Nature must and do propagate. The dogs do it in the yard, in the road, with an enthusiasm that borders on civic performance. Privacy is not a universal value.

But my table is not a public square. My table is not a nightclub. My table is not a lizard love motel.

I had to act.

I raised my voice, invoking my authority. I brought my full ancestral displeasure into the room. I told them firmly that this was unacceptable behavior. That they had violated sacred space. That they were out of line. Grossly. Spectacularly out of line.

Then I intervened physically. I brushed them apart. They scattered, skittered, scrambled up the wall in what I can only describe as a very undignified retreat, and escaped outside.

But I was not finished. I addressed them as they fled, issued a warning, a final notice.

I informed them that while I had shown mercy this time, I would not be so kind again. That I possessed a bottle with a formidable concoction of lavender and vinegar, originally designed to deal with flies (and let me tell you, with seven chicken farms in the vicinity, the flies are legion), but one that could very easily be repurposed.

I made it plain: Do not test me.

Now, I do not know if it was the male who instigated the situation, but I have my suspicions. There was a certain audacity about him. A brazenness. A disregard for protocol.

So I find myself still asking: what kind of creature enters someone else’s home, surveys the environment, and decides, “Yes. Here. On this table. This is where I will express my desires/lust/urges”?

The answer is: a lizard.

So we continue, the lizards and I, in this uneasy coexistence. They behind the pictures. I at my table. Boundaries drawn. Terms stated.

But should they forget themselves again, should passion overtake judgment and lead them once more onto my table…Well!!!

The lavender and vinegar will be waiting.

Daily Musings

Fern Gully & Its Face Sculptures

March 31, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

As a child growing up, ferns burrowed our veranda, so I guess it was natural that my mother’s love was transferred to me. However, ferns are not just decorative they are biofertilizer that helps with restoring the health of soil as well as preventing erosions and creating habitats for birds and other wild life. If you come to my yard, you will see ferns everywhere.

When I was about eight years old, my mother bought herself a car, a blue Ford Anglia, taught herself to drive, and got her license. I accompanied her on many of her self-taught lessons, so when she passed the driver’s licence exam on the first go-around, I celebrated her victory by jumping up and down and hugging her around the neck. Many of the men in the community had said she would not pass, but my mother had plans and did not take on any of those men, determined to be independent.

Thereafter, at least once a month, she would drive us from Caymanas Estate, St Catherine to Montego Bay, St James (literally across the island) to visit her sister and other relatives, and we would also go to Jericho to see our grandmother. In those early days, just after independence, my mother was one of the few female drivers on the road, and when men on the road tried to race her, she showed her skills, much to the amazement of many of them.

Naturally, at that time, there was no freeway. We drove Flat Bridge, then through Fern Gully, which became one of my favourite places. I loved the lush dampness and always thought of it as a womb, nature’s best shelter. My mother, too, loved ferns and Fern Gully, and a hush would descend inside the car as we drove through the three-mile stretch, which my mother said had the most varied species of fern anywhere in the world, reportedly 300 different types

I have to confess that my mother often stopped and snipped pieces she did not possess. The earthy smell, the artists selling crafts, the womb-like enclosure and luxuriance have made a lasting impression. So when I had children, I made sure to drive them through Fern Gully. However, the erection of the highway cuts off and bypassed that extravagant beauty, so I have not driven through in a long time, until last week.

Although still magical, Fern Gully is not so lush as before and I seriously doubt the different species of fern left. From Hurricane Melissa, trees have fallen, but what is sadly clear is that the government has not ensured the preservation of the beauty of this place, which should be a world heritage site, a tourist destination, and a field-trip excursion for students to learn about the value and uses of fern. Fern Gully is a historical and ecological site that should be preserved for us as a safeguard against soil erosion and a habitat to birds and other wild life.

Many might not know that ferns serve many purpose and are extracted for lotion and baths. There has been and continues to be extensive research being done, and herbalist recommends ferns both internally as tea for cough and fevers and for external uses to treat skin diseases such as itching, rashes and even eczema.

However, my recent visit was prompted by an article I saw by photographer and archivist Donnette Zacca, discussing the wall sculptures of Arthur Alexander, who is now dead, having disappeared a few years ago. I did not remember those carvings, and I wanted to see if they still existed, and they do!

Almost at the end of Fern Gully, before you enter Ocho Rios, on the left-hand side, are the sculptures carved into the rock by a man known as Arthur Alexander. These sculptures are fading, but they are still there, and an effort should be made to preserve them and a plaque placed in his honour.

No one seems to know what happened to Alexander, but I am simply thankful for this man and the tremendous work that he has left as his legacy, doing what humans have always done across time: carving into rocks, giving shape to what is available, leaving an indelible mark.

I invite travellers and motorists to skip the highway and head to Ocho Rios via Fern Gully. Observe the ferns, and you will notice that your breathing slows, you feel more relaxed, and your heart begins to smile. Stop towards the end of the gully; there is a safe place for cars to pull over. Inhale. Extend your arms. Look up! Observe keenly and notice how many different species of fern you detect. Stand there for a while and relish the sight, the sounds, the smell, and look closely at Arthur Alexander’s amazing facial sculptures.

Really look at these faces carved into stone. He was not commissioned. He was not paid. He was an artist, working from instinct, from vision, from something deeper. And he did this on his own. I want to remember him. To immortalize him. To thank him for showing us that art, in all its forms, is a testament to who we are, what we are, and what we are capable of.

I appeal to Minister Grange, of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, to preserve and protect, and to apply whatever care-treatment or facing is needed so that these carvings do not disappear. Also, let’s restore Fern Gully to a national site that can still boast 300 different species of fern.

Long live and Bless Up Fern Gully and Arthur Alexander.

Daily Musings

MY MOTHER WAS WHAT LEADERSHIP OUGHT TO BE

March 11, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

Keynote delivered for the Soroptimist International 63^rd Charter Anniversary, Kingston, Jamaica, February 23, 2026

Good afternoon, ladies.

I am so happy to be here. So happy to see you.

You are all leaders. Thanks to each of you for giving of your time and skills to such worthy causes that help to strengthen and support many women and girls throughout this society.

I am honoured to be here to celebrate the awardees Dr. Christine Fray, recipient of The Grace Allen Young Award and Vice Admiral Antonette Wemyss-Gorman, recipient of The Stella Gregory Award for Excellence. These women, like each of you exemplify leadership.

As I stand here today and look out at you, Louise Bennett’s “Jamaica Oman” poem comes to mind. Allow me to recite the first stanza:

Jamaica oman cunny, sah!

Is how dem jinnal so?

Look how long dem liberated

An de man dem never know!

This stanza speaks volumes, especially if we pay attention to the adjectives, cunny and jinnal, which means shrewd and the ability to outsmart and get over any situation. But this is just a preamble to where I want to begin.

I want to begin by telling you my story.

I was born from between a woman’s thighs.

There is no metaphor more powerful than that. No leadership seminar more profound. No boardroom more sacred.

I was born late on a Saturday night. My mother had just finished ironing. She said she folded the last shirt, and then her water broke. There was no dramatic rush to a private hospital. I was delivered at home by a midwife, my mother’s best friend, a nurse/midwife who worked at Kingston Public Hospital.

My mother was 25.

Young. Brave. Married.

But my father was not home. He was out drinking with his friends.

It is said I came early but the truth is I came because I was ready. My mother was ready and so was the midwife. My safe birth happened because two women co-lead and ushered me into the world.

That is the greatest form of leadership.

There is an old saying:

“Water is fluid, soft, and yielding. But water will wear away rock, which is rigid and cannot yield… What is soft is strong.”

My mother was soft.

And she was one of the strongest human beings I have ever known.

She is the measure by which I understand leadership.

Her name will not be found in history books unless I put it there. But she changed lives. She changed policies in small rooms to make conditions for cane-cutters at Caymanas Estate in the 1960s better. She shifted outcomes in kitchens and clinics, by teaching house wives stuck at home facing abuse, skills that gave them economic freedom. She raised children who whom she infused with social commitment and who would not bow.

So before i go any further, I want to pause.

I want each of you to think of a woman you know, a woman who leads, but whose name may never be printed in gold letters or appear in any history book unless you write it.

Because leadership is often mismeasured.

In the wider world leadership is measure it by titles, or offices or applause.

But leadership is not just position.

Leadership is responsibility.

Leadership is integrity.

Leadership is who shows up when things fall apart, and we know all too often it is us women who show up for our children, for our communities and for each other.

When we speak about leadership, we often list its qualities:

Integrity and honesty which translate into acting ethically to build trust.
Communication and listening which implies truly hearing people.
Empathy and emotional intelligence which is understanding the emotions in a room before speaking, feeling who is present and working to touch those persons.
Then there is accountability, which is often challenging as it means taking ownership of mistakes, owning them and not shying away from saying I was wrong and I apologize.
Without Vision there is no leadership, as a leader must be present abut also able to see beyond today’s crisis to arrive at solutions.
Leaderships is also about Empowerment lifting up others.
Being Resilient which requires bending without breaking.
A leader is Confident and able to Make Decisions that will benefit the majority.

If I placed my mother against that list, she would stand tall. She demonstrated these qualities, but she is not listed in any history books, and more likely neither are any of the women you thought about earlier.

And here is the irony.

Jamaica has the highest proportion of female managers in the world , over 59%, according to the International Labour Organization.

We lead. We show up. We give of our time and energy.

However, globally, women make up only about 5% of CEOs of the largest corporations. In Latin America, that number once hovered below 2%.

So what does that tell us?

That women lead daily, but not always where “power” is most concentrated.

So when women do rise to visible leadership, we applaud them, like we applaud Vice Admiral Antonette Wemyss-Gorman, the first woman to achieve this level of success in what is considered a male-dominated field.

We applaud Portia Simpson-Miller, Jamaica’s first female Prime Minister, for being tallawah.

We remember Sirimavo Bandaranaike, the first female Prime Minister in the world from Sri Lanka.

We recognize Mia Mottley in Barbados, and women across Denmark, Italy, Latvia, and beyond, who have ascended to the highest office in their respective countries.

But I want to ask a crucial question.

Are women leading differently? Vice Admiral, I put you on the spot – are you leading differently?

Are female leaders inheriting the same systems and performing the same scripts as their male predecessors?

I hope not because I do not simply want a woman in power.

I want a woman whose leadership is transformative.

Nurturing.

Inclusive.

Rooted in equity and fairness, rooted in compromise when necessary for the greater good. We have had enough flexing of muscles.

We do not need more wars. We do not need more dissension. We do not need more division.

We need leadership that understands soil and sea.

Leadership that understands that Hurricane Melissa was not an accident. It was the result of years of extraction, dumping, neglect. Years of ignoring warning signs.

If we do not pause and take responsibility, we will meet another Melissa by another name.

And so leadership must extend beyond the binary.

It must extend beyond ego.

It must extend beyond short-term gain.

Because I have a grandchild, Quetzilla, that means light feather.

And I want to believe I am helping to create a world worthy of her.

The world will continue to test women, especially women leaders.

And here I hear the voice of Maya Angelou whispering:

“You may encounter many defeats, but you must not be defeated…” The women I saw washing clothes at the river in Hanover a month after Hurricane Melissa, with their children wading and playing in the water ere not defeated.

Although, sometime leadership requires defeat.

It requires failure.

But as Oprah Winfrey reminds us: “Failure is another steppingstone to greatness.”

Here in this room is greatness, each of you, and leadership. And it is because you have failed many times why you are sitting here today celebrating.

The triumph cannot be had without the struggle, says Wilma Rudolph, who became the first American woman to win three gold medals in a single Olympic Game in 1960 after overcoming polio.

She knows. She had to overcome and sometimes look through many struggles to succeed.

Leadership is not pretty.

It is not polished Instagram posts.

It is often sewage systems fixed.

It is roads maintained.

It is children in western Jamaica who still sit in tents months after the hurricane to learn.

Leadership ensure that electricity is restored and clean water is flowing in schools, clinics and hospitals.

It is not looking away when we drive past garbage piled high and pretend not to see.

Where is the leadership that will make this island clean and beautiful , not once a year at Christmastime, but daily?

Where is the leadership that refuses to falter to support its neighbour, Cuba that has always supported us?

And here, I turn to Angela Davis to remind myself:

“I’m no longer accepting the things I cannot change… I’m changing the things I cannot accept.” What are the things you can no longer accept that you will help to change?

That is leadership.

Leadership says: I refuse to normalize dysfunction.

Leadership says: I refuse to accept inequity.

Leadership says: I will not waver.

But here is the truth that may unsettle us. We cannot rely only on leadership from the top.

Leadership must rise from the base.

Each of us is leading directly or indirectly, and others are watching, observing.

How do you lead your family?
How do you lead your friends?
How do you lead your church?
How do you lead your community?

You know, if we are waiting for someone to rescue us, you will be waiting a long time, and it means you have misunderstood power.

Don’t sit down and wait for the opportunities to come. Get up and make them.

That is not just motivational language. That is civic instruction.

And when doubt creeps in, and it will, remember Wilma Rudolph who said:

“‘I can’t’ are two words that have never been in my vocabulary.”

Leadership begins in vocabulary.

It begins in what we permit ourselves to say.

Cicely Tyson once said:

“Challenges make you discover things about yourself that you never really knew.”

And leadership is a series of challenges.

Ella Fitzgerald reminds us:

“Just don’t give up what you’re trying to do. Where there is love and inspiration, I don’t think you can go wrong.”

Love.

Not ego.

Not dominance.

Love.

So today, as we honour women, as we honour a woman leader, I celebrate her.

But I also invite her, and all of us, to examine the kind of leadership we practice and the type of leadership we applaud.

Does it serve the majority?

Does it protect the vulnerable?

Does it understand that we are no better than the soil beneath our feet?

Does it understand that leadership is not about the individual; it is about the community?

My mother understood that.

She did not have a podium.

She did not have a press conference.

But she had integrity.

She had accountability.

She had vision.

She did not falter. She worked hard with others and help to bring about important changes.

That is the standard. By which I live and judge effective, impactful leadership.

So as you leave here today, I do not want you merely applauding women in power.

I want you reflective.

I want you asking:

What kind of leadership do I model?

What kind of leadership do I demand?

What kind of Jamaica do I want my grandchildren to inherit?

Because leadership is not a title.

Leadership is a practice.

Leadership is daily doing.

Leadership is soft and therefore strong. Like water.

And if we are fluid, if we are soft, if we are yielding in wisdom but firm in principle we will wear away what is rigid and unjust.

We will shape this country.

We will shape this world.

And when history looks back, it may not record every name.

But it will record the shift.

And perhaps, somewhere, a young girl will say:

My mother was what leadership ought to be.

And she will rise.

And we will all rise and take our places.

Salute to women leaders!

Asé

Thank you.

Daily Musings

Seeing What We See and Allowing Others to Help Us See More Closely

February 22, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

I had the pleasure of having breakfast with Donnette Zacca, one of Jamaica’s leading photographers. It was in her backyard, beneath the almond tree, light filtering through green like a whispered benediction, the sun warming my shoulders and the trickle of the water quieting my galloping thoughts. There was a fountain there and in the course of our conversation Zacca said, almost casually, that she had made it.

As a photographer (I too do photography) I know that light is everything. Light is revelation. Light is confession. Light is an open door, a path and a gift. Light is the difference between seeing and knowing.

At one point she moved my chair. Gently, deliberately.
“I want you to look at this,” she said.

It was the fountain. The woman who was the face of the fountain.
“Look at her. And tell me what she evokes.”

I have always believed that objects and things talk if you listen closely. This is not madness. Or perhaps it is the madness of the artist, that holy disturbance that insists the world is speaking. It was a profound experience and reminder for me.

As I watched the woman: stone, water, plants, silence, I heard her saying very clearly that she was beginning to see the light and that the greyness was lifting. I felt it almost physically, as if the greyness was rising from her chest up to her head, dissolving into the air. She was coming to recognize the light in herself and the light she brings.

And even though she had long worn a crown on her head, she had not recognized her queenliness.

Perhaps she was speaking.
Perhaps it was me speaking about myself.

Perhaps it was Donnette speaking through her into my head, forcing me to see, to really see.

Zacca spoke about how she loves the light from the sun under the almond tree in that amazing garden she has made; how she spends countless hours, days, weeks, maybe years taking images of the flowers in her yard from different angles, simply to see how the light plays with them. How the light tickles and arouses them. How the light transform them. Zacca is clear, ‘I witness the way light touches petal, leaf, stone, skin.”

It was a profound exercise in seeing and in giving voice to what you see. And I think how this guidance is so important to children, helping them to see, to open their eyes and their hearts. and see.

I think this is what artists do. They allow you, and sometimes they force you to see beyond what is visible. To hear what you are seeing. To understand that sight is not passive; it is participation. It is moving outside your head into your heart.

As an anarchist, as a writer, as a photographer, Zacca talks about the storytelling element in her photography. Anyone familiar with her work knows this. And certainly, as a writer of poetry and prose, I understand that impulse. My last adult collection, The Storyteller’s Return, is about seeing Jamaica after being away for a long time and asserting that storytellers are always present in our environment. The land remembers. The streets speak. The trees testify. The people expound and explode.

So when Donnette invited me to look at the light, to see how it reflected and played upon the statue she created, a statue she often uses as meditation, she was not simply offering another lens. She was offering an invitation, and gifting me another lens through which to see.

And I am sharing it because it is an invitation for all of us.

To see what is in front of us.
To hear what is in front of us.
To understand that the environment and the objects around us are witnesses.

Even though they are supposedly inanimate objects, they reflect, diffuse, and project their own stories onto us. They wait for our attention. They wait for our humility.

If we listen.
If we look keenly.
If we allow someone to move our chair.

So I want to Big Up Donnette Zacca, whose work I very much appreciate. Ithank her for reminding me what seeing is and how necessary it is, in this distracted world, to truly see what is already present in our environment.

Because sometimes the light is there all along.
And we are simply waiting for someone to say,

Look again.

Daily Musings

Will Jamaica, the Caribbean, Africa, and the World Stand By and Allow Cuba to Die?

February 15, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa 1 Comment

There is hardly a country in the Caribbean, including Jamaica, that has not benefited from the generosity of the Cuban people.

More than 500 Cuban doctors currently serve in Jamaican hospitals and clinics, many in rural communities where access to medical care would otherwise be limited or non-existent. Across the region, Cuban medical professionals quietly and consistently save lives. Through programs such as those of the Henry Reeve International Medical Brigade, Cuba has also sent doctors to assist nations in times of crisis, from the COVID-19 emergency in Italy to outbreaks and disasters in Africa and Latin America.

Cuba has trained Caribbean students in medicine for decades. Jamaican doctors have studied at the Latin American School of Medicine in Havana and returned home to serve their communities. In Africa, Cuban doctors and teachers have worked in countries such as Angola, Mozambique, and South Africa during some of their most difficult periods.

This is not a political argument about communism versus democracy. It is a humanitarian appeal.

Today, ordinary Cubans, elders, children, families, face severe shortages of fuel, food, and medical supplies. The long-standing embargo imposed by the United States continues to affect daily life in profound ways. Regardless of one’s political position, the human cost is undeniable.

The question before us is simple: when a neighbour who has repeatedly come to our aid is in distress, do we turn away? Do we pretend as if we have not benefitted from their generosity?

Humanitarian assistance is not an endorsement of any government. Providing fuel so hospitals can operate, medicine so children can receive treatment, and food so elders do not go hungry is not ideology ; it is reciprocity. It is solidarity. It is humanity.

Jamaica sits less than 100 miles from Cuba. Our histories, cultures, and futures are intertwined. Across the Caribbean and Africa, thousands are alive today because Cuban doctors showed up when others did not.

If we believe in justice, in fairness, in shared humanity, then this is a moment to act with moral clarity. Governments can debate policy. But people of conscience must insist that humanitarian corridors remain open and that aid reach those in need.

We must not allow ordinary Cubans to suffer in darkness when they have brought healing and light to so many of us.

This is a call to Caribbean people, to Africans, to Europeans, to all who believe in human dignity to stand for compassion over division.

Let us be a blanket for Cuba in its hour of need.

Let us respond not with politics, but with humanity. Help Cubans to live.

Daily Musings

I Want AI to Help Me Write 30 Books

February 11, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

I’ve written 26 books on my own in the last 30 years, so maybe AI can help me write 20 more before I die. What are the big issues?

I had never used AI until January 2025, when my daughter came and said, “Mommy, why aren’t you using AI? It could help you write quicker.” She showed me. I thought about it, but I didn’t use it again until March 2025 when I was touring in Europe. I had written one presentation for an institution, and they wanted another. The professor said, “You know everything. Why don’t you just tell it to AI and AI will organize it?”

Tell it to AI and AI will organize it? Okay, let’s try that.

I did. AI organized it. I was astounded.

I don’t believe in what they call writer’s block. I’ve never had it. I have ideas coming through my eyes, my nose, every pore of my body. I could write ten million books; I just don’t have the time. So 2025 was my first time really using AI, and it was only on those two occasions.

Then I was talking to my daughter again, telling her how frustrated I was about writing to someone. I wanted the right tone. I didn’t want it to sound abrasive or accusatory. She said, “Let AI in.” I thought, let AI in? She said, “Yes. Write your letter, then ask it to soften it.”

I tried. I was shocked! AI did what I asked, but also quicker than I ever could. I was truly muffled – is that the word?

I remembered: when I was in school, we didn’t have calculators. When my children were in school, they had calculators, and I thought that was cheating. But they used them. I used a typewriter all through college because computers didn’t exist then. You fed in the paper, changed the ribbon, retyped whole pages if you made an error, until whiteout came along. Then came the computer when I was doing my master’s. A big, clunky machine, like the old televisions. Floppy disks. I had so many floppy disks. I may have thrown some away with invaluable work on them.

Technology changes. It improves.

The debate about AI and writing is real. As a professor last semester, I read some student papers and thought: this does not sound like them. I see them in class. I know how they speak. I spoke to a colleague who mentioned Turnitin. I asked my students directly. They swore they hadn’t used AI, or only used it for organizing. Because I don’t know enough about AI to accuse anyone, I asked them to include a disclosure: either that they didn’t use AI or to explain how they did.

Then I thought about my own writing.

My first novel went through eight drafts because I didn’t know what I was doing. I was experimenting. I didn’t want to write a traditional novel in the traditional sense. It Begins with Tears went through eight drafts. When it was accepted, the publisher said it was too long—about a hundred pages too long. We had to cut it. The editor suggested changes to improve flow, to move paragraphs around.

Is that so different from what AI does only faster? I don’t know.

Every book I’ve published, 26 so far contains my thoughts, my ideas. Yes, I’ve had writing groups. They made suggestions: move this, clarify that, deepen this scene. When one uses AI that way, is it not similar to an editor or a writing group?

The other way is when you have no ideas and tell AI to write the paper for you.

I haven’t done that. But I am curious. I want to try asking AI to write a story I haven’t written yet, in my voice, and see whether people would know.

What am I saying? I’m saying the technology is here. None of us can stop it. The question is whether we use it ethically.

I have begun using AI as a business tool. It helps me produce documents much faster. It paginates, organizes, structures in ways that would take me hours. And I think about all the technologies that have come into being since I was a child.

When I was growing up, we had no telephone. Some people did. We didn’t. Later we got one. Now everyone has a cell phone, from the poorest to the richest, from rural to urban. Microwaves. YouTube. Twitter. Posts, tags, podcasts, meetups, LinkedIn. Followers. Groups. Fans. It is mind-boggling. The world is moving so fast.

I need help. I hope AI can help me.

I’ve been working on a book about my father for eight years, since he died. I thought I’d finished by now. Yes, I’ve written many other things in between. The book is halfway done. Maybe if I took two focused weeks, like they advertise with AI,I could finish the other half this year and send it out.

The world has changed. I don’t always recognize it. I like to think I’m hip and young. I’m not. But I still want to do a lot before I die. If AI can help me, then yes—AI, help me.

I want to write 30 more books. The ideas are bursting in my head.

What is the legitimacy of AI? What is the moral obligation? Is it not simply part of the evolution: from longhand, to typewriter, to computer, to this new tool?

I want to use the tools that make my life better and more productive. The stories I carry, AI does not have. I must feed it my stories. It does not know the Jamaican landscape the way I do unless I give it that landscape.

So is it not still my book?

Does AI claim ownership? Is it a predator, a thief? When I feed it my stories, does it claim them?

This debate will continue for some time. I am not firm where I stand, meaning each of us stories are unique and should write those stories, even with help.

When I was a child going from Kingston to Montego Bay took nearly all day. Now on the new highway I can go there and back, two or three times in the same day. I can fly to Africa in a day and it took my enslaved ancestors months of crossing. Everything is faster. The year just began and it is February already.

Technology helps us and it also harms us; it stymies our memories. Without my cell phone I am lost. I do not know one person’s number.

But I am grateful to have been introduced to AI. I plan to use it more frequently, and more effectively. Perhaps I will even learn how to use it well enough to prosper from it.

So tell me, good folks, is this me, Opal’s work? Or is it AI’s?

Tell it to AI and AI will organize it? Okay, let’s try that.

I did. AI organized it. I was astounded.

I tried. I was shocked! AI did what I asked, but also quicker than I ever could. I was truly muffled – is that the word?

Technology changes. It improves.

Then I thought about my own writing.

Is that so different from what AI does only faster? I don’t know.

The other way is when you have no ideas and tell AI to write the paper for you.

I haven’t done that. But I am curious. I want to try asking AI to write a story I haven’t written yet, in my voice, and see whether people would know.

What am I saying? I’m saying the technology is here. None of us can stop it. The question is whether we use it ethically.

I need help. I hope AI can help me.

The world has changed. I don’t always recognize it. I like to think I’m hip and young. I’m not. But I still want to do a lot before I die. If AI can help me, then yes—AI, help me.

I want to write 30 more books. The ideas are bursting in my head.

What is the legitimacy of AI? What is the moral obligation? Is it not simply part of the evolution: from longhand, to typewriter, to computer, to this new tool?

So is it not still my book?

Does AI claim ownership? Is it a predator, a thief? When I feed it my stories, does it claim them?

This debate will continue for some time. I am not firm where I stand, meaning each of us stories are unique and should write those stories, even with help.

Technology helps us and it also harms us; it stymies our memories. Without my cell phone I am lost. I do not know one person’s number.

But I am grateful to have been introduced to AI. I plan to use it more frequently, and more effectively. Perhaps I will even learn how to use it well enough to prosper from it.

So tell me, good folks, is this me, Opal’s work? Or is it AI’s?

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Daily Musings

The Lonely Midlife Blues

February 4, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa 1 Comment

Lately, I’ve been speaking to a number of friends who are in their 60s, most of whom are single, or divorced, and many of whom are feeling lonely. It reminded me of a time when I lived in California and there was a group of us, married and divorced., who talked seriously about buying property in the Caribbean so that when we reached 60s, 70s, and 80s we could live in community. We imagined a shared life because we held similar political, cultural, and social values and we could be independent, not alone, even though most of us had children.

This feels important now, this idea of imagining a new way of being. Loneliness is widespread, not just among women. Many of us, myself included, are creative productive people. We stay busy with our writing and other creative practices we’ve always pursued and will continue to pursue. But as we get older, we feel more vulnerable.

There was a moment when I almost slipped in the bathtub, and I wondered: if I fell and couldn’t reach my phone, how long would I be there? Most people have accidents in their homes. How long before someone would find me? My son calls me once a week. My daughter calls me. People do call me. But I hadn’t really established a dependable rhythm though I’m beginning to now, where someone would notice if they didn’t hear from me every day. I have friends who check in daily with their sisters. I’ve been so independent. I’ve traveled the world alone, gone off the beaten track. I remember once trekking somewhere and seeing a sign that said, Bears around. And I thought, Oh my God, I’m here alone in this country. A bear could attack me and nobody would know. I hadn’t even told anyone where I was. I barely knew where I was myself.

Loneliness is real even when you are living fully. It is important that at a certain age, 60s you creat checks and balances so people check in on you daily, so if they don’t hear from me, they’ll

raise the alarm. Those of us in the autumn of our lives and who are still active and vibrant must develop systems where we can come together in meaningful ways on a regular basis. I still have a lot of adventure in me. I still want to explore. I don’t like driving, and night driving has become difficult, as it has for many of my friends.

They tell me, “Opal, have events early so we can get home before dark.” But maybe we don’t have to worry about the dark if a few of us come together, pool resources, and hire someone to drive us so we can still enjoy the nightlife we love.

Loneliness is a major problem in many societies because of fragmentation because families and communities have changed. I was surprised when I taught a class in California and young people spoke openly about being lonely. I thought, When I was 20, loneliness never even crossed my mind. I was busy, meeting people, engaged with life. But now, for people my age to meet new people, it feels almost impossible unless you go online and then you don’t know what you’re finding.

So I am appealing to people in the autumn of their life not to allow loneliness to isolate you. Don’t allow it to stop you from enjoying the things you love. Don’t allow it to make you cranky, afraid, or small. You have lived an amazing life. You’ve done splendid, wonderful things. And until the day you die, you deserve to live fully and to have company.

One recommendation I always make is to have friends of all ages. We tend to cluster with people our own age, but we need friendships with people in their 30s, 40s, and 50s too, friendships that span generations, friendships with people who understand that you still want to do things and will include you. I’m lucky in that regard. My niece and her children include me in many of their activities.

So let us, in this middle, ripening age of maturity and wisdom, create spaces for ourselves, spaces that allow us to continue

Daily Musings

Too Much Is My Name: Not Unfocused

January 25, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa 1 Comment

So I’ve been trying to navigate that delicate path of sharing what I want and aspire to with the people I love. I remember being three years old and always being told, you want too much, you’re doing too much, you’re this, you’re that. So who I am was always too much for the people I loved, and still is. It’s never, Oh my gosh, you have all these brilliant ideas and projects. I want to help you with them, or connect you with people who can help you. Instead, it’s always, Why are you doing this? Why are you doing that? Why don’t you focus? As if the ideas and projects I carry mean I am somehow unfocused or scattered.

Most people, can only do one thing or choose to only do one thing. My brain has never worked that way. It is busy. I realize that I’m not seeking affirmation, because I am who I am, and I’m going to do what I do. But it is really painful to feel that when you share your dreams and ideas with the people you love, rather than seeing them through your eyes, they dissect them and decide they are too much, that they mean you are not focused.

And I find myself asking: how do we get over this hump of living our lives fully? I think I’ve done that, in many ways. But how do you live fully without tripping over what the people you love say and do, without being wounded by their doubts, without shrinking yourself to fit their comfort? How do you become free and wild enough to be your full self? Does that happen? And how does one achieve that if you are deeply connected to people, if you deeply love those people and deeply want them to remain in your life? And are often deeply hurt by their responses to who you are.

How does one achieve that sense of complete autonomy and still remain tender? How do you not be hurt or stymied by other people’s evaluations of how you are living your life and the things you want to achieve?

Because if you say you want to achieve something and you haven’t yet, they say, Do you see? You said that five years ago. And yes, I did say that five years ago. I did hope it would happen five years ago. But the fact that it hasn’t happened doesn’t mean it won’t happen. It doesn’t mean I should abandon it simply because time has passed. I still want it. And maybe that is naïve, but I still think it is possible.

I am all of my hopes and aspirations. I want to be seen and accepted as such, nothingness, nothing more. Just that who I am, and the things I value, are not discounted and diminished and dissected, but seen for what they are. I want people not to accuse me of lacking focus or trying to do too much, but instead to help me do all the things that I can do, or to guide me in how I might do them, even if they feel it is too much.

And I think, at this stage in my life, it shouldn’t matter what people think about me or my projects, whether it’s my children, my family, or the people I admire. I wish I could get to that stage where it didn’t matter, where it wasn’t so hurtful, so painful. But as human beings, we are connected to other human beings. We want their love and their approval. And if we love them deeply, as I do, then we want them to celebrate us, not through their eyes, but through ours.

I don’t want to seem as if all the things I want to do are too much. Yes, I need support. And yes, maybe I should say, this year all I’m doing is one book, not three, and nothing else. But my brain, my mind, doesn’t work like that. I’ve never wanted to be like anyone else. I say that with a certain level of aplomb. I’ve always just wanted to be me, and I’ve always wanted to be accepted as me.

But I haven’t found that in many places. And I want to publicly acknowledge that.

Daily Musings

I WILL NOT DESPAIR

January 3, 2026 Opal Palmer Adisa Leave a comment

In order to keep despair from taking over my life, sometime toward the middle of last year, I made a conscious decision to stop watching the news. I figured that whatever I truly needed to know, I would know. Every time I watched or listened, I was overwhelmed by sadness, by grief, by a deep sense of hopelessness. I realized that if I wanted to keep living, if I wanted even a small measure of optimism, I had to be present to where I was, to my immediate life.

I understand, too, that I am privileged. I have a nice home. I have a yard. I am surrounded by nature. I do not take that lightly. And I know there are entertainers and athletes with money who are giving, who have projects, who are helping. But as I try to do my own work, preserving Louise Bennett’s legacy, adopting a Chester Castle Primary devastated by Hurricane Melissa, October 2025, seeking funds to get a children’s magazine for the Caribbean off the ground, and I keep hitting the same wall of insufficient financial support, I find myself asking: What is it that I am not doing? What am I not seeing? How do I make this happen?

Because there is not an absence of wealth or resources. There is an abundance. It may not be equally distributed, but it exists. I am a writer. I am an activist. All of my projects are about giving voice, about providing resources to people who do not have them. I truly did not think it would be this hard to secure 200 loaded backpacks for children of whom 75 percent have lost their homes to the hurricane. A loaded backpack costs about US$100, roughly JM$11,000. Why should getting 200 be so difficult?

Why is it so difficult to secure funding to honor Louise Bennett and Jamaican culture? I am trying to understand how to navigate this space, how to connect with the right people, how to know that I am doing as much as I can, helping as many people as I can. Maybe there is something falsely heroic, in that thinking. I don’t know. What I do know is that I genuinely want to help. But I do not have the resources.

Even my own Adisa Ancestry Artists Residency, which I launched in 2005—I am grateful that I stopped waiting for permission or help and simply did it. But I think about its future. I think about continuity. How do I maximize what I have? And how do I find the benefactors, the philanthropists, who can help ensure that it continues?

This is not despair. This is me searching for the light at the end of the tunnel, trying to continue the work I believe I am here to do, and asking plainly for the support I need.

So this is a plea. A plea to all the people who are my friends, all the people I know. If you can afford $20, or $50, or $100, or $500, or $5,000, or $5 million, send it. I will do exactly what I have outlined. You will be acknowledged. You will see the results of what your money made possible.

I still am not going to listen to the news in 2026. I am deeply saddened by the state of the world, saddened that on my own island beaches are locked off. I recently paid JM$2,000 to go to a beach –something I believe is criminal. What that means is that the vast majority of Jamaicans cannot afford access to what should belong to all of us. Some of us can afford it. Many cannot. And while not everyone will be rich or have the same resources, there are basic things everyone should have access to.

Everyone should have access to nature and parks. In the Caribbean, everyone should have access to all the beaches that should be maintained, with clean restroom facilities and changing areas—and that access should be free. I believe that everyone, even if they live in a single room, should be growing something: a plant, a tomato, a string bean, okra, cucumber, pumpkin, cane. We have to start. Not always in a grand way, though we need a grand plan, but we must start.

We must start so that I do not slip into despair. So that I can continue to believe that I make a difference, that I can make a difference, and that each individual can. We can, and we must.

This is my plea.
And this is my prayer for 2026.

Please note the deadline to contribute to Chester Castle Primary school in Hanover is extended until I am able to gift each child a loaded bagpack. Thanks for your support.