Our Story

River Lily Press was founded at the turn of the 21st century as the imaginings of one woman, who felt called to bring the beautiful, vital poems of several friends into book form, so that she could pull them from her bookshelf, whenever she sought their insights and rhythms. For twenty years, Cyra Sweet Dumitru had been in writing circle with these friends on a monthly basis, sharing drafts of poems, offering and receiving respectful, honest response.

For even longer, she had been writing poems and keeping a journal as a means of keeping herself grounded in a complex world full of vibrations and paradox, tragedies, and luminosities. She had a book of her own poems already published through Pecan Grove Press called What the Body Knows, and a second collection that needed a good home called Listening to Light.

Listening to Light explores, in part, Judeo-Christian themes and stories through poetry, and yet it does not embrace orthodox ideas about the meaning of Jesus. Cyra realized that the collection would struggle to find a home because it was probably too Christian for a secular press, yet too independent for a Christian press. Why not self-publish the book? And, while she was self-publishing Listening to Light, why not underwrite as well the cost of bringing to publication first books of poems by two close friends whose poems she admired and drew breath from?

When she shared this dream with graphic artist Andrea Ptak, with whom she had been creating four-color hospital magazines and patient information booklets for several years, Cyra discovered that Andrea had been schooled in the art of book design. A book producing partnership was born. Cyra focused upon the editing and project management while Andrea designed the logo for River Lily Press, became its graphic designer and productions advisor. Three books of poems, and one book of short stories were created and financed by the Press between 1999 and 2003, with book sales being pretty lively. (See Catalog.)

Yet, as her children grew older, as her college teaching responsibilities became more intense, as she facilitated therapeutic writing circles for teens and children as the Children’s Bereavement Center of South Texas, and as her elders needed increasing levels of support, Cyra suspended publishing and promoting the Press. Andrea continued to design magazines and various publications, working with publishers such as Purdue University Press, Berg Publishers, and Bloomsbury Press, while also developing her voice as a writer. Cyra published two more collections of poems through Pecan Grove Press and Finishing Line Press. Cyra also pursued a three-year certification process in poetic medicine, becoming a certified Practitioner of Poetic Medicine through The Institute for Poetic Medicine founded by John Fox.

Just before the pandemic infiltrated the globe in early 2020, Cyra and Andrea began to talk about reimagining and reviving River Lily Press. This time the business model would focus upon providing an imprint, and highly professional guidance concerning editing, book design, production, and self-promotion to writers and poets who wanted to be deeply involved in the creation of their own books and had the energy to present their work directly to the larger world. No longer would Cyra underwrite the initial cost of producing books for other people.

In 2021, the opportunity to assist a friend and St. Mary’s University colleague bring an inventive, inspiring, insightful, and genre-bending manuscript into book form launched River Lily Press into re-energized life. A new season of ushering lilies into view begins.