[1][2] Jennifer Mary Haynes was born in Chatswood, New South Wales, on 28 November 1941.
She then studied English and psychology at University of Sydney, graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in 1962.
[4] At university, she was affiliated with the Downtown Push, "a loose group of artists, bohemians, and libertarians which included Clive James and Germaine Greer".
She received an Australia Council Senior Literary Fellowship in 1978 and had two books of poems published.
Her Collected Poems was edited posthumously by Judith Rodriguez and published in 1990.