Cheryl Xavier

Cheryl Antao-Xavier has been writing poetry for over 20 years and her poems have been published in anthologies and literary magazines. Her first collection of poems entitled Dance of the Peacock has just been published to critical acclaim through her own publishing company, In Our Words.

Cheryl’s poems are vignettes of the human experience that capture the trials and angst of people in transition and women in subjugation, painted against a vivid landscape of the Indian sub-continent.

Cheryl is the Chair of the Peel region branch of the Canadian Federation of Poets and a member of The Ontario Poetry Society and the Mississauga Arts Council.

She is also a playwright and her first play, a comedy, is under production through SAWITRI (South Asian Women’s Inter-cultural Theatre and Research Initiative) and will be staged at the Mosaic festival in Mississauga in June 2008.

Book:

Dance of the Peacock

Published by In Our Words

In association with A Type of Magic

Reviews for Dance of the Peacock:

"Dance of the Peacock is a beautifully crafted display of scintillating poetry in a divine layout that is delicious to the senses. It is a gracious voyage through a lifetime of experiences and observations. Cheryl conquers any topic and extracts gifts that you may not be conscious of, but are now immediately aware.

She uses all elements of creativity to provide not just a reading adventure, but a destination of enlightenment."

Tracy Repchuk
Bestselling author of 31 Days to Millionaire Marketing Miracles
President and Founder of the Canadian Federation of Poets
Editor and Founder of Poetry Canada magazine

"Cheryl Antao-Xavier is one of Canada's rising stars in poetry. Dance of The Peacock is her first full collection, comprising beautifully crafted melodies which will carry you away on the “wings of the wind” to exotic and faraway places.  Her lucid, reflective poems on human relationships, placed within a fascinating landscape of colourful proportions, evoke the emotional climate and backdrop of the poet’s life. 

The variety of sections make the book an easy read, and you will be entertained by the masterful and subliminal messages which are portrayed with wit and wisdom."

I.B. (Bunny) Iskov, Founder, The Ontario Poetry Society

"What blazes out from this iridescent turquoise fan-tailed language-rich poetry is an energetic hope.  The softer tones go deep.  The gentle narratives, the elegies, the sweet ghazals, the imagistic brevity of haiku give variety of voice to the work.  In [Antao-Xavier’s] introduction she concludes in an intimate address to the reader, “My own dance has been a long time in rehearsal and now begins in earnest.”  This dance within this book is mature and well worth the wait."   

Reviewed by John B. Lee, Poet Laureate of Brantford