Mei-mei Berssenbrugge

Sphericity was published by Kelsey Street Press in 1993, and was her second collaboration with Richard Tuttle. The first edition of Sphericity was limited to 2000 copies, with the first 50 signed by Berssenbrugge and Tuttle and hand-colored by Tuttle. The book consists of six long poems, all with several numbered stanzas: "Ideal"; "Size"; "Combustion"; "Sphericity"; "Experience"; and "Value".

Empathy was published by Station Hill Press in 1989, and contains three numbered groups of poems. The verso indicates that some of the poems appeared in Bridge, Calaban, Conjunctions, Parnassus, Temblor, and Tyuonyi. The book is dedicated to Bradford Morrow and Sheffield Van Buren, and contains the following poems:

Random Possession was published by I. Reed Books in 1982. On the contents page the poems are separated spatially into five unnumbered groups (with only the first three listed on the contents page). The pagination bears out the scheme, with one empty page between the groups. The book contains the following poems:

Berssenbrugge was born in Beijing to Chinese and Dutch-American parents, and grew up near Boston, Massachusetts. She was educated at Barnard, Reed, and Columbia University. After receiving her M.F.A. from Columbia in 1974, she settled in rural northern New Mexico, which has remained her primary residence ever since.

Summits Move with the Tide, subtitled (on the cover of the second edition) Poems and a Play, is Berssenbrugge's second collection of poems. It was published by the Greenfield Review Press in 1974, and later in 1982. The acknowledgments page indicates that some of the poems previously appeared in First Issue, Intro 3, East-West Journal, Cathedral, Ash Tree, Gidra, and Greenwood Press. In contrast to her later books, most of the poems in the collection are short, with only a few carrying over to new pages. Additionally, only two poems are broken into numbered stanzas, a format Berssenbrugge would use in later poems. The poems in the collection are organized into four groups: three groups of poems, and one play, One, Two Cups.

Fish Souls is Berssenbrugge's first published collection of poems. It was published by Greenwood Press in 1971. Only 100 numbered copies were published. Information about this volume is scarce.

After receiving her degree, Berssenbrugge became active in the multicultural poetry movement of the 1970s along with Leslie Marmon Silko as well as Ishmael Reed, theater director Frank Chin, and political activist Kathleen Chang. Berssenbrugge taught at the Institute of American Indian Art in Santa Fe, where she co-founded the internal literary journal Tyuonyi.

Mei-mei Berssenbrugge (Chinese: 白萱华; pinyin: Bái Xuānhuá; born October 5, 1947, in Beijing, China) is a contemporary poet. Winner of two American Book Awards, her work is often associated with the Language School, the poetry of the New York School, phenomenology, and visual art. She is married to the painter Richard Tuttle, with whom she has frequently collaborated.