Introduction: Mitch Rayes

By his own minimalist account (despite not of an age or level of consciousness to be a reliable witness), featured reader, 'burque poetry fixture and foundation slammer, Mitch Rayes was born breech in Detroit in 1958, the first of six children to a former Irish nun and a Lebanese chemist. He attended Wayne State University in Detroit as a Merit Scholar and Naropa Institute in 1977, before the school was accredited. During the 1990's, he was influential in the developing Albuquerque poetry scene as a founder of the poetry non-profit Flaming Tongues, editor of the Tongue newsletter for eight years and producer of several Albuquerque Poetry Festivals.

Mitch, photo by Wes Naman, 

from Local IQ cover story, March 2010

"why local poetry matters" (an oral history)

At present, Mitch lives in his contractor’s office in Albuquerque’s industrial corridor and is currently working on converting part of his shop into an arts space called The Projects.