Born in Harlem, New York, he performed with the Cosmos Nucleus poetry performance group and served as a journalist/editor-in-chief of Sunday Morning, a Christian newspaper in New York City. He won first prize in poetry in the 1976 National Ossie Davis/Ruby Dee Write-On Competition and has performed his children’s poetry in schools and libraries throughout the metropolitan New York City and northern New Jersey area. He is listed with Poets & Writers. His poetry recently has been included in anthologies published by the International Library of Poetry, and his letters to the editor and poetry have been published regularly in the Montclair Times. He has been published under his own name as well as under Jayne Lyn Smythe and Oronde Lasana. His children’s poetry can be seen at http://www.geocities.com/bascomber. He lives in Montclair, New Jersey