"Poem after poem raised the hair on my arms. I was moved and inspired all the way through."
- Marsha de la O, poet, author of Creatures
Mary Kay Rummel grew up in St. Paul near the Mississippi and the corner where Montreal, Lexington and West Seventh meet near Highland Park. She was the first Poet Laureate of Ventura County, CA. Little River of Amazements: New and Selected Poems is her tenth published poetry book, her eighth full collection. Blue Light Press also published Nocturnes: Between Flesh and Stone, Cypher Garden, The Lifeline Trembles, as a winner of the 2014 Blue Light Press Award and What's Left is the Singing. This Body She's Entered, her first book, won the Minnesota Voices Award for poetry and was published by New Rivers Press in 1989. It was a finalist for the Minnesota Book Award. She was a recipient of a Loft Mentor award. Her work has appeared in numerous regional, national, and international literary journals and anthologies and has received several awards, including ten Pushcart nominations. She was a co-editor of Psalms of Cinder & Silt, a collection of community poems related to recent California wildfires published by Glenna Luschei at Solo Press. Her poems have been published in many journals and anthologies centered in both California and the Midwest including Water~Stone Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, MiraMar, Anacapa Review, Gyroscope Review, Conestoga Zen, Pirene's Fountain, Salt, Askew, Spillway and as a frequent finalist for the Pablo Neruda Prize, in Nimrod.
Mary Kay has read her poems in many venues in the US, England and Ireland and has been a featured reader at poetry festivals including in the Ojai Poetry Festival and San Luis Obisbo Poetry Fest. She has participated in numerous poetry residencies including Anderson House and Vermont Studio Center and performs poetry with musicians. She has collaborated with artists in the US and England, most recently at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts. A Professor Emerita from the University of Minnesota, Duluth, Mary Kay also taught at the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, and at California State University, Channel Islands.
She is a founding board member of the nonprofit Ventura County Poetry Project. She and her husband, Conrad (Tim), live in California and Minnesota, near children and grandchildren in both states. She can be contacted through email at marykayrummel.com
