SINGER Jahmene Douglas has poured his heart out in his first collection of poems.
The 26-year-old, who has spoken frankly about the mental scars caused by abuse he suffered as a child, published Unfathomable Phantasmagoria this month. It features 75 poems penned over several years.
“As a singer you have a very physical experience,” he said. “This time I wanted to give something a bit more deep and personal.”
Although the 2012 X Factor runner-up is an experienced songwriter, poetry has a very different feel for him.
“It feels a lot more therapeutic,” he said.
“I think it is good to write things out.”
Songwriting is also more structured, he said: “You have to hit your chorus and your bridge.”
Jahmene, who has been writing poetry since he was 12, said the work covered everything he had been through during his teenage years and into adulthood, including the domestic violence his mother Mandy Thomas suffered.
“It is literally from my heart to the reader,” he said.
“I have tried to write them in a way where they end with a resolution, they end with hope.”
Mandy wrote about her experiences in the book You Can’t Run.
Jahmene, whose brother Daniel took his own life nine years ago after their violent father was released from prison, is following in her footsteps with his next project – his own book exploring domestic abuse from the point of a child.
“I think writing the poetry prepared me for it,” he said.
He explained the effects often came out when victims reached their 20s and their mental health suffered.
The book, which bears the same name as his 2016 album, is available online through Amazon.
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