Jewelle Gomez was born in Boston, MA and raised there by her great grandmother. Her background is Native American (Wampanoag & Ioway) and African American on her mother's side and Cape Verdean on her father's. Her writing has always been an exploration of the margins and intersections of ethnicity, class, gender and sexuality. Her first book was a collection of poetry, The Lipstick Papers, self-published in 1980.

She began her writing in the late 1960s when she was on the original staff of "Say Brother" (WGBH-TV) one of the first weekly Black television shows in the US. She served, in the 1980s, on the foundingl board of the Gay and Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) which has become the largest LGBT media watchdog in the world. Her first essays were written for feminist publications such as CONDITIONS, a lesbian feminist literary journal and Homegirls, the first Black feminist anthology.

She was the recipient of a literary fellowship from the National Endowment on the Arts and two literary residencies from the California Endowment for the Arts.

Her most well-known work is the novel, The Gilda Stories, published by Firebrand Books. Now a cult favorite, it has been in print since its publication in 1991 and is taught in classrooms around the country. It remains the only Black, lesbian, feminist vampire novel and easily marries lyrical language to epic action over a span of 200 years. The full length play she wrote, Bones & Ash, was based on two chapters of the novel. It was commissioned and performed by the Urban Bush Women Dance Company and toured 13 U.S. cities. The play script and original novel were published in a companion volume by the Paperback Book Club.

Additional publications include two other poetry collections: Flamingoes & Bears and Oral Tradition; a book of personal essays, 43 Septembers; and a collection of short stories, Don't Explain.

Her writing has appeared in numerous anthologies including: Dark Matter-A Century of Speculative Fiction by African American Writers, Best American Poetry of 2001 and The Oxford World Treasury of Love Stories.

She is the President of the San Francisco Public Library Commission and has done fundraising for LGBT and arts non-profits for 25 years.