Ted Kooser

Theodore J. Kooser (born 1939) is an American poet born in Ames, Iowa. He worked for 35 years as an insurance executive while publishing poetry, served as U.S. Poet Laureate from 2004 to 2006—the first from the Great Plains—and won the 2005 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry for Delights & Shadows. Known for his accessible, conversational style drawing from Midwestern life, he founded "American Life in Poetry" and taught at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Official site.