Ted Kooser served two terms as US Poet Laureate and won the Pulitzer Prize for Delights & Shadows in 2004. The poet lives and writes on 62 acres of wooded hills and pasture in rural Nebraska. For many years Kooser worked at a desk in the life insurance business and then, after he retired he taught poetry writing at the University of Nebraska.

He is the author of fifteen books of poetry, five volumes of nonfiction, five children's picture books, and seventeen chapbooks and special editions. He served two terms as U.S. Poet Laureate and his 2004 collection of poems, Delights & Shadows, was awarded the Pulitzer Prize. Prior to the publication of A Man with a Rake, his most recent collection of poems is Red Stilts, from Copper Canyon Press. More about his life, his work, and his many honors can be found at www.tedkooser.net.