Poet Ghazala Alam says, "My losses and struggles made me into a poet."The daughter of Indian immigrants, Ghazala was born and raised in Pakistan and grew up in a culture rich in the Urdu language and literary arts. She fondly recalls listening to her father recite and explain Iqbal's Urdu and Persian poetry. She also enjoyed the singing of devotional Sufi poetry on televised Qawwali programs with her mother.As a young woman, she sought refuge in Europe and then, in 1991, she began building her new life as an immigrant and proud citizen of the United States. Facing her trials and challenges with grit and resolve, she has found that travelers on life's journey share a common inner humanity that always restores hope and faith.As a practicing physician, Ghazala Alam has seen the torment of an Alzheimer's patient, the helplessness of someone facing terminal cancer, and the inertia of a depressed mind. It is her own experiences of joy and grief, and her observations of other's experiences, that inspire her to write Urdu poetry and express the Urdu literary style in her English poetry.