He grew up in suburban Washington, D. C. He graduated from Ohio University.He teaches at Northern Illinois University, since 1995.
His essays and prose poems appear in American Letters & Commentary, Brevity, Caketrain, Diagram, Fourth Genre, Free Verse, Georgia Review, Gulf Coast, Hotel Amerika, Laurel Review, new Ohio review, Quarter After Eight, River Teeth, Seneca Review, Sentence, Under the Sun.
He lives along with his wife, Amy Newman, a professor and poet in DeKalb, Illinois.