About Kaya


Kaya Oakes' collection of poetry, Telegraph, received the Transcontinental Poetry Prize from Pavement Saw Press. Her poems have previously appeared in VOLT, Conduit, Shampoo, Tarpaulin Sky, and many other journals. She has twice been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and has twice received awards from the Academy of American Poets, as well as writing education grants from the Mellon Foundation and the Bay Area Writing Project. She helped found Kitchen Sink Magazine in 2002, and was its senior editor until 2007. She teaches writing at UC Berkeley.

Kaya is a native of Oakland, California. Before she began teaching, she worked in bookstores, warehouses, cafes, as a housecleaner, at a flower stand, and in comic book publishing. She has played in many punk and experimental music bands, and she is a classically trained cellist. She earned her MFA in creative writing at St. Mary's College of California. Her academic and teaching interests include composition, modern and post-modern American poetry and the avant-garde, and all aspects of popular culture. She is currently teaching a writing course that focuses on the ways in which underground music forms are appropriated by mainstream culture. She lives in Emeryville, California.