"I was simmering, simmering, simmering. Emerson brought me to a boil."
--Walt Whitman

Winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the National Book Award, Mary Oliver is the author of "The Leaf and the Cloud, West Wind, "and "A Poetry Handbook, "among others. Over the past two decades she has taught at various colleges and universities--Case Western Reserve, Bucknell, Sweet Briar College, the University of Cincinnati, and Bennington College in Vermont. She lives in Provincetown, Massachusetts, and Hobe Sound, Florida.