Tamika "T.L." Murphy is from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She has been writing poetry since the age of thirteen. Her poetic inspirations are Sylvia Plath, Maya Angelou, June Jordan, Emily Dickinson, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Lord Byron, Nikki Giovanni, Sonia Sanchez, and Gwendolyn Brooks. As a lover of the written word, and creativity, her motto is "Everyone should find their creative voice and nuture it. In the end our words will far surpass us in the land of the living."