Gilfillan was born and raised in Mount Gilead, Ohio, where his outdoorsman father (Merrill C. Gilfillan) worked as a naturalist for the state's Department of Natural Resources and helped inspire an early fascination with the natural world and its creatures. Gilfillan graduated in 1967 from the University of Michigan. He attended the University of Iowa Writer's Workshop for two years, studying with Ted Berrigan, Anselm Hollo, and George Starbuck, among others. He lived and worked in New York City for eight years and then moved to Colorado, which served as a base for frequent expeditions to the Great Plains and other regions of America from which he reports in essays, poetry, and short stories. He now lives in Asheville, North Carolina.
Books
Poetry
Truck, Angel Hair Books, New York, 1970
9:15, Doones Press, Bowling Green, OH, 1970
Skyliner, Blue Wind Press, Berkeley, 1974
To Creature, Blue Wind Press, Berkeley, 1975
Light Years: Selected Early Poems, Blue Wind Press, Berkeley, 1977
River through Rivertown, The Figures, Great Barrington, MA, 1982
Coppers and Blues, Plum Pit, Boulder, 1997
On Heart River, Dayo, Denver, 1995
Satin Street, Moyer Bell, Wakefield, RI, 1997
The Seasons, Adventures in Poetry, New York | Boston, 2002
Small Weathers, Qua Books, Jamestown, RI, 2004
Undanceable, Flood Editions, Chicago, 2005
Selected Poems 1965-2000, Adventures in Poetry, New York & Boston 2005 ISBN 0-9761612-2-2
The Bark of the Dog, Flood Editions, Chicago 2010 ISBN 978-0-9819520-5-5
Red Mavis, Flood Editions, Chicago 2014 ISBN 978-0-9838893-7-3
Essays
Magpie Rising: Sketches from the Great Plains, Pruett | Vintage | Bison, 1988 | 1990 | 2003
Burnt House to Paw Paw: Appalachian Notes, Hard Press, West Stockbridge, MA, 1997
Chokecherry Places: Essays from the High Plains, Johnson Books, Boulder, 1998
Rivers & Birds, Johnson Books, Boulder, 2003
The Warbler Road, Flood Editions, Chicago, 2010 ISBN 978-0-9819520-4-8
Fiction
Sworn Before Cranes, Crown, New York, 1994
Grasshopper Falls, Hanging Loose, Brooklyn, 2000
Awards
1967, Major Hopwood Award for poetry, University of Michigan
1989, PEN/Martha Albrand Award for First Nonfiction for Magpie Rising
