On February 18, 2007, Gene Frumkin passed away in his home in Albuquerque at the age of 79.

He was born in New York City on January 29, 1928, to Samuel and Sarah Frumkin. Gene moved to Los Angeles as a young boy with his parents, experiencing, as he puts it, “the Golden Age” of Southern California. Gene graduated from UCLA in 1951 with a Bachelor's Degree in English. In 1966 he was offered a one-year teaching position at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque. He remained working at UNM for about 30 years and played a big role in building the creative writing program there.

Cinco Puntos published a book of poems by Gene Frumkin titled Saturn Is Mostly Weather. His poetics are complex and open-ended, international in perspective; they embrace a wide variety of influence, ranging from Yiddish (his first language) to the contemporary workings of the Language poets. But his poems also maintain an insistence on the Southwestern influence, in particular, the importance of place and narrative in the poem.

You can find more books of poetry by him through La Alameda Press and other publishers. You can find some poems and more information about Gene Frumkin on the Santa Fe Broadside Project.

After Gene Frumkin's death, friends of his got together in Albuquerque and read his poetry as a celebratory tribute.