Michael Meyerhofer's first book, Leaving Iowa, won the Liam Rector First Book Prize for Poetry from Briery Creek Press. His chapbook, Cardboard Urn, won the Copperdome Poetry Contest from Southeast Missouri State University. His work has appeared in North American Review, MARGIE, Green Mountains Review, Southern Poetry Review, Arts & Letters, Diagram, and others. He has also been a Pushcart Nominee and a finalist for the Philip Levine Book Prize, the MARGIE First Book Contest, the James Wright Poetry Award, and the Fineline Competition. He received his Masters in Fine Arts from Southern Illinois University at Carbondale.

Other poems by Michael Meyerhofer in Verse Daily:
October 19, 2006:   "The Trouble with Hammers" " The trouble with owning hammers..."

Books by Michael Meyerhofer: Leaving Iowa by Michael Meyerhofer

Other poems on the web by Michael Meyerhofer:
Three Poems
Two poems
"My Mother's Darkness"
"Grief Song"

About Leaving Iowa:

"There's real voice: an all-too-rare accomplishment in these days of gentrified poetry. The language here is consistently fresh-a volatile mix of humor and anger, spot-on pity and forgiveness-that gives the ears meaningful work to do."
—Craig Challender

"Michael Meyerhofer's poems embody the voice of a poet and person always reaching for and striving after those mythic and elusive human qualities — beauty, wonder, knowledge, desire. But even when this poet's narratives describe a world where the quest for those qualities is thwarted, his work is always readable, relatable, and recognizable. There's humor here too-not the humor of the easy laugh and quick joke, but a profound humor born of wisdom and experience. This book is the start of a career that will mean much to those readers of poetry in search of a writer who will never falter in telling them the hard yet gorgeous truths of life."
—Allison Joseph

Meyerhofer has the inner resources and the craft to address worlds imagined and ideal, but he insists on writing chiefly of this one, and he does it fearlessly, masking neither warmth nor anger. He accomplishes in his first book what many never approach, a personal candor, a rare balance of humor and seriousness. He reminds me of a young James Wright. He reveals the heart as do few other poets who have suffered an education."
—Rodney Jones