The John B. and Elena Diaz-Verson Amos Distinguished Chair in English Letters at Georgia State University, USA. David’s first book, Shooting Rats at the Bibb County Dump, was chosen by Robert Penn Warren as winner of the 1979 Walt Whitman Award of the Academy of American Poets. His works have appeared in numerous publications and he has received many awards, including the Levinson Prize from Poetry magazine, an Ingram Merrill Award, an Award in Literature from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters. In 2000, Governor Roy Barnes appointed him Georgia Poet Laureate, and he is a 2011 recipient of a Governor’s Award in the Humanities. More about David appears in the The New Georgia Encyclopedia.