“It is then they will say they always loved us.”
— The Gospel of an Un-Bahamian God
In a literary moment increasingly defined by questions of identity, faith, and diaspora, Bahamian author and spoken-word artist John Shaquille Poitier Jr. is emerging as one of the most distinctive young voices navigating those intersections. Through poetry, performance, and multimedia storytelling, Poitier’s work reflects the complex experience of belonging to more than one world at once, culturally, spiritually, and geographically; for his exploration of diaspora and generational memory builds upon a greater understanding of what it means to exist in the current world.
A multi-published writer before the age of twenty, Poitier has spent the past several years crafting a body of work that blends intimate personal reflection with sweeping cultural inquiry. His writing explores the tensions between Caribbean heritage and American life, between inherited religious tradition and personal belief, and between the histories we inherit and the identities we ultimately claim for ourselves.
Currently, Poitier is the author of three books—Mangoes in the Summertime, The Birds, and Son of Elohim. Across these works, he examines memory, spirituality, and cultural belonging through vivid imagery and narrative lyricism. Drawing deeply from his upbringing in The Bahamas, His poetry and cultural commentary draw heavily from returns to landscapes of ocean, church, family, and migration, spaces where identity is negotiated and history quietly lingers beneath everyday life.
Readers often describe Poitier’s voice as both introspective and culturally resonant. His poems move fluidly between the personal and the collective, weaving autobiographical experience with broader reflections on race, faith, and the legacies of colonial history in the Caribbean.
Additionally, Poitier’s work has already begun attracting national and international attention. He was selected as a recipient of the Association of Writers & Writing Programs (AWP) HBCU Fellowship, which brought him to Los Angeles to participate in one of the world’s largest literary conferences.
His voice has also found a powerful platform in performance. A skilled orator and spoken-word artist, Poitier has earned Fourth Place nationally in Informative Speaking and national placements in spoken-word competitions, demonstrating the rare ability to command both page and stage. His creative achievements have also earned him The Bahamas’ National Youth Award nomination in Arts and Culture, recognizing his growing influence in contemporary literary and artistic spaces.
In December, Poitier expanded his creative practice with the release of his spoken-word poetry album, Phone Calls to My Sisters, and Other Desktop Recordings from an Insubordinate Fool. The project captures the intimacy of voice-driven storytelling, blending poetry with recorded performance to create a deeply personal listening experience. Through the album, Poitier transforms everyday reflections, late-night thoughts, family memories, spiritual questioning, into powerful spoken narratives.
He is also the creator and host of the podcast Darling, I’m Depressed Again (Don’t Tell My Mother), where he speaks candidly about mental health, faith, and identity. The podcast continues his commitment to storytelling that is both vulnerable and socially engaged, creating space for conversations that many young people struggle to have openly.
What distinguishes Poitier’s work from many of his contemporaries is his perspective as a Bahamian writer engaging simultaneously with Caribbean and global cultural frameworks. His poetry often examines the psychological terrain of diaspora: what it means to leave home, to reinterpret inherited traditions, and to carry the weight of multiple identities at once.
In Poitier’s writing, the Caribbean becomes both memory and metaphor. Mangrove forests, ocean tides, church sermons, and family histories appear not only as imagery but as living archives of cultural inheritance. His work often asks difficult questions about colonial legacy, generational faith, and the shifting meaning of belonging for young people navigating the modern world.
These themes continue in his forthcoming collection, The Gospel of an Un-Bahamian God, scheduled for release in April. The book’s title suggests a bold interrogation of inherited belief systems and national narratives, topics Poitier has long explored through his poetry.
At the heart of The Gospel of an Un-Bahamian God is a meditation on what it means to inherit both faith and history. Through poems that move between personal memory and collective experience, Poitier examines the tensions between religion, race, and cultural identity in the Caribbean and beyond. The collection confronts questions of spiritual authority, colonial influence, and generational expectation while also offering moments of tenderness, humor, and quiet resistance. In Poitier’s hands, poetry becomes a space where inherited narratives are not only remembered, but challenged and reimagined.
Today, Poitier continues developing his work while writing and performing across multiple creative forms. From late-night drafting sessions and recorded spoken-word performances to public readings and literary collaborations, his practice reflects the rhythms of a young writer actively shaping his voice in real time. To Poitier, poetry remains both a personal discipline and a public conversation, a way of documenting lived experience while inviting readers to confront the cultural, spiritual, and historical forces that shape the world they inhabit.
Again, for Poitier, writing is not simply about publishing poems or performing on stage; it is about exploring the deeper questions that shape identity and belonging. His work seeks to bridge literature, performance, and cultural commentary, creating a platform where art becomes a lens through which larger human experiences can be examined.
As his audience continues to grow, John Shaquille Poitier Jr. is positioning himself as part of a new generation of Caribbean writers whose voices resonate far beyond their islands, contemporary poetry writers who understand that the most powerful stories often emerge from the spaces between worlds.