After attending Middlebury College, Rolly Kent received an MFA from the University of Arizona. For many years he taught poetry around the Southwest, and ran one of the first public library-based community writers projects, bringing poets and writers to prisons, nursing homes, women’s shelters and branch libraries in Tucson. His work has appeared in numerous magazines, including The American Poetry Review, The Atlantic, The Nation, and Poetry. He is the author of The Wreck in Post Office Canyon and Spirit, Hurry. He lives in Los Angeles. 

In line after line Rolly Kent bridges the gap between poet and reader that has been the basis for the cult of aestheticism. He fulfills the function of the poet: to give one the means to live better. I, for one, am grateful.

- Richard Selzer