Her career as a poet began in 1970 and extends to this year's recent translation of part of her work in the bilingual anthology Para ser estrella a medianoche (Arrebato Libros, 2022).

Always on the cutting edge, she has collaborated with many of the most important artists of the second half of the 20th century and has been awarded the American Book Award and the Shelley Memorial Award of The Poetry Society of America. Her work, which has been translated into multiple languages, has been presented at conferences and festivals around the world. Patti Smith has called her poetry a psychic shield for our times.

Beyond her poetry, she is one of the founders of the Poetry Project at St Mark's Church In-the-Bowery, New Yoirk, and in 1974 she founded the Jack Kerouac School at Naropa University with Allen Ginsberg and Diana di Prima, where she continues to work in its summer programme.