His father, a pharmacist, was from Saint Vincent and his mother, Luzmilda, a community activist, was Jamaican, born in Costa Rica.

The Umbra Workshop drew young writers to the Lower East Side of New York City in search of their artistic voices.

It served as a crucible for emerging black poets, among them Ishmael Reed, David Henderson and Calvin C. Hernton.

[6] From 1968 to 1972 Thomas served in the U.S. Navy, attaining the rate of 2nd Class Petty Office (E-5) Radioman.

[7] In 2000, he published Extraordinary Measures: Afrocentric Modernism and 20th-Century American Poetry, his overview of the work of James Fenton and Amiri Baraka, among others.