Mei-mei Berssenbrugge

Mei-mei Berssenbrugge (; born October 5, 1947, in Beijing, China) is a contemporary Chinese American 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 the 2026 recipient of the Frost Medal for distinguished lifetime achievement in poetry. Early life and education Berssenbrugge was born in Beijing to Chinese and Dutch American parents. Her mother was an educated mathematician, and her American father was born to first-generation Dutch emigrants.

The book contains the following poems:

Group 1: "Aegean"; "Finn Song to the Bear Ghosts"; "Bog"; "Book of the Dead, Prayer"; "El Bosco"; "Spirit"; "Hopi Basketweaver Song"; "Beetle Is Born, Lives ..."; "Los Sangre de Cristos"; "In Bhaudanath"; "Snow Mountains"; "Red Backs & Autumn Leaves ..."; and "Ghost".

Group 2: "Old Man Let's Go Fishing In ..."; "Travelling [sic] Through Your Country"; "Propeller Sleep"; "Fish & Swimmers & Lonely Birds ..."; "Spaces Are Death"; "The Second Moment"; "The Third Moment"; "Perpetual Motions"; "Leaving Your Country"; "The Old Know by Midsummer"; and "Abortion".

Group 3: "Written Before Easter in New York"; "Chronicle"; "Tracks"; "On the Winter Solstice"; "Blossom"; "Hudson Ice Floes"; "Poor Mouse"; "Sky"; and "March Wind".

Group 4: The play, One, Two Cups.

Random Possession 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:

Group 1: "Chronicle".

Group 2: "The Membrane"; "Rabbit, Hair, Leaf"; "On the Mountain with the Deer"; "The Suspension Bridge"; "Numbers of the Date Become the Names of Birds"; "Spring Street Bar"; "Heat Wave"; "The Intention of Two Rivers"; "For The Tails of Comets"; and "Sleep".

Group 3: "The Field for Blue Corn"; "The Reservoir"; "The White Beaver"; "Breaking the Circumference"; "A Deer Listening"; "You and You"; and "Goodbye, Goodbye".

Group 4: "The Scientific Method (for Walter)"; "Walter Calls It a Dream Screen"; "The Constellation Quilt"; "Run-off and Silt"; "The Translation of Verver"; and "Commentary".

Group 5: "Tail".

The Heat Bird In The Heat Bird, Berssenbrugge shifted to a long-verse format. The book contains only four poems, all several pages long and broken into numbered stanzas: "Pack Rat Sieve"; "Farolita"; "Ricochet Off Water"; and "The Heat Bird". The verso indicates that some of the poems in the book were previously published in Conjunctions, Contact II, Roof, and Telephone.

Empathy 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:

Group 1: "The Blue Taj"; "Tan Tien"; "Alakanak Break-Up"; "Texas"; "Duration of Water"; "The Star Field"; and "Chinese Space".

Group 2: "Jealousy"; "Recitative"; "The Carmelites"; "The Margin"; "Naturalism"; and "Fog".

Group 3: "War Insurance"; "Empathy"; "The Swan"; "Forms of Politeness"; and "Honeymoon".

Sphericity 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".

Endocrinology Endocrinology is an artists' book poem made in collaboration with visual artist Kiki Smith. Forty copies were produced by Universal Limited Art Editions from a maquette made by Berssenbrugge and Smith. The Kelsey Street Press edition, a facsimile of the original book, was limited to 2,000 copies, with the first 60 signed and numbered.

Personal life Berssenbrugge is married to the painter Richard Tuttle, with whom she has frequently collaborated.

Awards

1976 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. 1980 American Book Award for Random Possession. 1981 National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship. 1984 American Book Award for The Heat Bird. 1990 National Endowment for the Arts Award. 1990 PEN West Award for Empathy. 1998 Asian American Literary Award for Endocrinology. 1999 Western States Book Award for Four Year Old Girl. 2004 Asian American Literary Award for Nest. 2026 Frost Medal, awarded by the Poetry Society of America for lifetime achievement in poetry.

Broadsides The Mouse 5. IE Poetry Broadside Series Two, Clayton Fine Books, 2006. "Issued in an edition of 25 copies of which 20 copies are for sale."

Magazines and journals

Berssenbrugge, Mei-mei. The Mouse, Conjunctions, Number 48, Spring 2007.

Anthologies