Dennis Sampson was born and raised in South Dakota. His seven volumes of poetry include The Double Genesis, Forgiveness, Constant Longing, Needlegrass, and For my Father Falling Asleep at Saint Mary's Hospital, Within the Shadow of a Man, and The Lunatic in the Trees. The recipient of grants from The Virginia Council on the Arts and The North Carolina Arts Council, Sampson's poems have appeared in such magazines as The American Scholar, The Ohio Review, The Hudson Review and many others. He has taught as Writer-in-Residence at Sweet Briar College in Virginia, as the Visiting Poet in the M.F.A Program in Creative Writing at UNC Wilmington, and at Wake Forest University.