Born in a small town in Ohio, Oliver published her first book of poetry in 1963 at the age of twenty-three. Over the course of her long career, she has received numerous awards.

Her fourth book, American Primitive, won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1984. She has led workshops and held residencies at various colleges and universities, including Hennington College, where she held the Catharine Osgood Foster Chair for Distinguished Teaching. Oliver currently lives in Provincetown, Massachusetts.

Melissa Sweet has illustrated nearly 100 books for children, including Some Writer! The Story of E. B.White, which she also wrote, and The Right Word: Roget and His Thesaurus, which was awarded a Caldecott Honor.

She is also the illustrator of Firefly July: A Year of Very Short Poems. Melissa Sweet lives in Portland, USA.