I am often asked why I started to write poetry. The answer is that my motivation sprang from a visceral need to creatively articulate the experiences of the black youth of my generation, coming of age in a racist society.

Writing was a political act and poetry was a cultural weapon.

I don't go to see bands any more because I've got tinnitus, so I have to avoid loud music. You get used to it, but when it's quiet you hear a constant ringing.

The more I read my poems, the more I find out about them. I still read them with the same passion I felt when I wrote them as a young man.

I have never, ever sought validation from the arbiters of British poetic taste.

I am often asked why I started to write poetry. The answer is that my motivation sprang from a visceral need to creatively articulate the experiences of the black youth of my generation, coming of age in a racist society.

Once you have a disease like cancer, you look at life a bit differently. Some things that were important no longer seem as important as they were.