He attended the University of Iowa"s International Writers" workshop (Master of Arts 1969, Master of Fine Arts 1969), where he worked with Harry Duncan of Cummington Press, and founded Living Series, which published work by colleagues as broadsheets and chapbooks (Michael Lally and Ray DiPalma, among others).
Clifford began writing poetry at fourteen. His first collection, Manitoba in a Window (1965), was the first volume published by Canadian literary publisher, Coach House Press. As a student at the University of Toronto (Bachelor 1967), he shared the East.J.Pratt Prize with Michael Ondaatje.
Although he was invited as a delegate to the founding conference of the League of Canadian Poets, and helped organize the Kingston"s Writers" Association, the Kingston branch of Canadian Artists" Representation, and The Monday Night Boys, Clifford has never allied himself with a school, group or faction.
His work demonstrates this independence, moving between elegant, dense and often highly musical freer compositions to an unfashionable but exquisitely made formalism. Clifford has published in a broad range of journals, from The Canadian Forum, Queen"s Quarterly and American Red Cross to avant-garde magazines like bill bisset"s Blewointment, bpNichols"s ganglia, and Sheila Watson"s Pelican.
In 2004, Clifford left teaching to write full-time. He presently lives on the island of Grand Manan in the Bay of Fundy.
