Keep This Forever

Poetry. In this, his fifth book of poems, written in the aftermath of his father's death, Mark Halliday proves to be one of America's most intimate poets. Like Frank O'Hara and Kenneth Koch, Halliday's poems chat with the reader in earnest yet humorous ways and in wholly believable voices. Whether exploring grief or desire or loneliness, these poems never forget the human longing for permanence. "He is prolix and quotidian, a Whitman in a supermarket, a confessional poet who does not take himself very seriously.... His cool patter skewers pomposity..."--The New Yorker. Mark Halliday was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 1949, and grew up in Raleigh, North Carolina and then in Westport, Connecticut. He earned a B.A. at Brown University, an M.A. in creative writing at Brown, and a Ph.D. in English at Brandeis University. He has taught at Wellesley College, the University of Pennsylvania, Wilmington Friends School, Indiana University, Western Michigan University, and Ohio University.