Chris Forhan, born and raised in Seattle, Washington, is the author of three books of poetry: Black Leapt In, winner of the Barrow Street Press Poetry Prize; The Actual Moon, The Actual Stars, winner of the Morse Poetry Prize and a Washington State Book Award; and Forgive Us Our Happiness, winner of the Bakeless Prize. He is also the author of two chapbooks, x and Crumbs of Bread, and his poems have appeared in Poetry, Paris Review, Ploughshares, New England Review, Parnassus, and other magazines, as well as in The Best American Poetry. He has won a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship and two Pushcart Prizes and has been a resident at Yaddo and a fellow at Bread Loaf. He lives with his wife, the poet Alessandra Lynch, and their two sons, Milo and Oliver, in Indianapolis, where he teaches at Butler University.

Other poems by Chris Forhan in Verse Daily:
March 7, 2011:   "Aspirin and Shadow" "Moon I swallow at dawn..."
October 14, 2008:   "Nothing to It" by Chris Forhan
October 2, 2005:   "Dream: Obedience" " Some boys won't go willingly. I will...."

Books by Chris Forhan:

Other poems on the web by Chris Forhan:
"A Child’s Guide to Etiquette"
Two poems
"What My Father Left Behind"
"Gouge, Adze, Rasp, Hammer"
Two poems
"Vanishing Act"
"The Church of the Backyard"
"My Almost-Daughter, My Nearly-Was Son"

About Ransack and Dance:

"Ransack and Dance is a book by a poet reaching the heights of his art. Every word is where it is for a reason, and every sound is where it is for a reason. And those reasons add up to surprise and delight. This is the rarest thing for a collection of poems: there is not a line of prose in it!"
—Thomas Lux

"Chris Forhan's images and insights ... seem ... to spring from the poet's subconscious to the reader's, with the vessel of the poem their only necessary medium. I can think of no better reading experience or more that could be asked of the best poetry."
—Laura Kasischke