I’m a poet and visual artist who studied Poetry at Naropa Institute, now University, and I received my BA in Poetics in 1981, as part of Naropa’s first graduating class.

Originally from NYC, I come from a family of immigrants and artisans. I learned as a child how to improvise and ‘make do’. Since forever, that’s informed my practice and process, both for writing and for art making.

I live outside of Oaxaca, Mexico, where I first arrived 32 years ago, thanks to a seminal poetry grant from the Wallace Alexander Gerbode Foundation in San Francisco, Ca.

After stretching and finally exhausting the grant, I moved to Mexico City to find work 2.5 years later, as I wanted to stay in Mexico, and after 2.5 years there, I moved to NYC, my birthplace, again, to find work that would provide some stability.

I made good on my word about becoming a ‘citizen of the world.’

Bolstered by savings and curiosity, I moved from NYC to southern Morocco 5 years later, where I lived for close to 2 years, working on various projects. I investigated and wrote about the Tuareg nomads and I simultaneously designed and worked with a jeweler to produce a silver and copper jewelry collection based on ancient trade route fabrication techniques.

From there, I moved to Spain, where by necessity, I finally put my TEFL certificate to use and independently taught English to adults and to children for 10 years while also freelancing online as a proofreader, copyeditor and translator.

Oaxaca still called to me and I managed to finally return in 2013. This is home.

Mexico, and in particular, Oaxaca, gives me something I never found anywhere else: to misquote Gertrude Stein speaking about Paris, it’s not so much what Oaxaca gave me as what it didn’t take away from me. I could say I’m a poet and be respected. I could also make things here that I could only ever dream about in the US.

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detail from Pass-age - evidence & cadence / Pasadizo - evidencia y cadencia     2009