John Frederic Garmon was born at the edge of the old U.S. Route 66 in the Texas Panhandle in 1940. After serving in the Marines, he went to college and eventually received a Ph.D. at Ball State University. His poems have appeared in Prairie Schooner, Southern Poetry Review, Kansas Quarterly, Commonweal, and other journals. He is now serving as a dean at Yavapai College, Prescott, Arizona.