Avon J. Bellamy draws on the healing power of words and aims them like Cupid's arrows at the hearts of black women.
With poetry, he tries to soothe the pain in relationships among blacks, ease tension between men and women and, most of all, revive romance. He says his poems are meant to tell black women something they're told too rarely -- that they're special.
"We've lost respect for ourselves and our women in a way that we wouldn't have allowed to happen when I was a teen-ager," says Mr. Bellamy, 53, a Baltimore native.
That inspired Mr. Bellamy to write "The Sweeter the Juice," a book of poetry he published himself last year. It promotes the notion that long-standing, monogamous relationships need not lose an element of romance.
"Women don't like romance only on Valentine's Day," he says. "They like it all year round, and they're looking for somebody to play the part all year. Romance is the underpinning for relationships."
Eugenia Collier, chair of Morgan State University's department of English and language arts, says she appreciates the love and respect the poet shows.
"Our experience has been one of being rejected and mistreated in various ways," says Dr. Collier, who has known Mr. Bellamy for 25 years. "So yes, we definitely need something like that. We need to be treated gently, and we aren't always."
Mr. Bellamy, a resident of Northwest Baltimore, says his poetry draws on his experiences growing up in West Baltimore, his marriage of 27 years and his strong religious bond as an ordained Pentecostal minister.
His father was a laborer, his mother a file clerk. His most enduring childhood memories are of watching his parents kiss -- "How safe and warm I felt" -- and reading along with his mother in the family's living room.
His parents separated when he was 11. He became a truant and at age 18 landed in jail for theft, where he discovered poetry.
Eventually, he went to Morgan State. Although he never graduated, his writing samples persuaded administrators at the prestigious Johns Hopkins Writing Seminars postgraduate program to accept him. He earned a master's degree in 1971 and today earns his living teaching at Catonsville Community College three days a week.
His writing is influenced by Kahlil Gibran and Etheridge Knight. But the source of inspiration is his wife, Florence, with whom he has four children.
In his 27 years of marriage, he says, he has gained an increasing appreciation of how important his wife is to him and how important women are to men in all relationships. He blames Hollywood and gangster rap for glorifying brief, erotic encounters while ignoring sensuality in marriage.
"You have a lot of women who never hear real sentiment coming from their men after the courtship, and sometimes even during the courtship," Mrs. Bellamy says. "Avon is gentle and doesn't mind expressing his feelings, which makes him more masculine to me than a macho man who tries to hide his emotions."
At a reading by Mr. Bellamy at Morgan State last week, the poet recited to jazzy music that keyboardist Phillip Stancil played alongside him.
Charlotte Stewart left the event saying that more men should listen to Mr. Bellamy. Too many relationships fail because they lack romance, she says.
"It doesn't have to be expensive restaurants," says Ms. Stewart, 45. "Take us down to the harbor for ice cream in the summer, for a nice walk."
POEM
Be forever deep as African valleys and Congo rivers
and from time to time let me whisper into your heart
magic that brings you to the center of yourself
and nudges you past the crass
your head was meant for crowns
your lips were meant for a king's caress . . .
-- Avon Bellamy
"Until Time Peels Back the World"