Dave, born in Toronto, Canada, began putting his poems to music. This led to his migration to California to seek recognition as a songwriter. He played with several music acts in the Bay Area in the 1970s/1980s. Following the muse of writing, he went to San Francisco State University and earned Creative Writing degrees (B.A. ‘93, M.A. 1995). He is published in several poetry journals, won a Thomas Merton Foundation’s Poetry of the Sacred prize, and was featured in the 9th Annual Berkeley Poetry Festival in 2011. He is included in an anthology of Bay Area poets, My Dreaming Waking Life (2009).
Though mainly of English/Irish ancestry, he is also descended from a great story telling family, the Debassiges of West Bay First Nation Ojibwe, notable on Manitoulin Island (Ontario) for preserving the history of their Ojibwe leaders, elders, and warriors for over 300 years. His book, Voyages to Ancestral Islands, tells the story.
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