Self-portrait
Keith Polette (born Keith Paul Polette, September 18, 1954, St. Louis, Missouri, U.S.A.), writer and teacher, professor of English at the University of Texas at El Paso. He has published haibun, haiku, senryu, tanshi, and lyric poetry in dozens of print and online journals and major anthologies. He has received “editor’s choice” or similar awards from Presence, Cattails, haikuKatha, and Shamrock Haiku Journal. Polette’s book of haiku, The New World, was shortlisted for a THF Touchstone Distinguished Books Award in 2017, while his haibun collection, Pilgrimage, also shortlisted for a Touchstone, was named Best Haibun Book in the 2020 HSA Merit Book Awards. Soundings, a second book of haibun, was released in 2023. Polette has published four children’s books and numerous works on language arts pedagogy, literary criticism, and Jungian studies. He has been a returning guest editor for Drifting Sands Haibun Journal, a judge for the HPNC San Francisco International Haibun Contest (2021), and a judge for the Touchstone Haibun Awards (2023). Polette resides in El Paso, Texas.
Note: This is an abstract of a longer biographical article to come.