Edward Hirsch was born on January 20, 1950, in Skokie, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. He attended Grinnell College in Iowa, graduating in 1972. He then embarked on a Watson traveling fellowship to study the relationship of violence to poetic form in England, Wales, and France. Hirsch earned a Ph.D. in folklore from the University of Pennsylvania in 1979, two years after marrying Janet Landay. During his doctoral program, he was an instructor with Poetry in the Schools programs in New York and Pennsylvania. Afterward, Hirsch taught at Wayne State University and then at the University of Houston.

Hirsch's first book, For the Sleepwalkers (1981), is a collection of energetic and imaginative poems that frequently depict insomnia and comment on themes such as art, survival, and loss. In 1986, Hirsch published his second collection of poetry, Wild Gratitude, which includes "Omen." It was a critical success, winning a National Book Critics...