Significant Readings:

New York Public Library-96^th Street, Jefferson Market, Mid-Manhattan, Columbia U., Nassau College, Dowling College, St. Joseph’s College, Adelphi U., L.I.U. Southampton, Barnes and Noble- Union Square, Chelsea, Waterstone’s Books, Dublin Ireland, Killmallock Arts Festival, Limerick and Ballina all in Ireland, The Walt Whitman Birthplace, University of Vienna, University of Salzburg, University of Graz, C.W.Post College, The Langston Hughes Cultural Arts Center in Queens, The Parish Museum Southampton, NY , The Bowery Poetry Club, The University of Rome, Dowling College, Five Towns College, Oswego University, Brooklyn Historical Society, Molloy College, Empire State College, Cornelia Street Café, Housing Works Books, Suffolk County Community College, Stony Brook University, Poets House, St. Benet’s Church London, The Goethe Institut (Washington, D.C), The Library of Congress, The United Nations, Boston University Medical Campus, Old South Meeting House, Boston, Gibson’s Books, Titcomb’s Bookshop, Frost Place in Franconia, NH, Harvard College, McNally Jackson Books in NYC, Trinity Church-Camden/London, The Irish Writers Centre-Dublin, Salmon Literary Centre, Quay Books Limerick, O’Bheal Cork City, iBAM Chicago, The Fells, the Robert Frost House in Franconia, NH, and more than 100 other locations since 1987.

His work has appeared in such prestigious journals as Confrontation, The Recorder, Nassau Review, Oxford, National Forum, Hawaii Pacific Review, Commonweal, Parnassus, Opium, Istanbul Literature Review, Sulfur River, Mobius, Pedestal, Rattapallax, LUNGFULL, Poetry Salzburg Review, Prairie Poetry, The New York Times, The Journal of The American Medical Association, Literary Matters (Oxford University Press), Medical Humanities Journal, Hektoen International, The Humanist, American Atheist, iManhattan, The Seventh Quarry, Exit 13, Columbia Journal, Contemporary Literature Review,The East River Review, FEKT (Kosovo), The Journal of Dental Humanities, Levure Litteraire (France), Mobius, New Contrast:South African Journal, Nomad’s Choir, Obalnet (Slovenia),Palehouse, Sfera Eonica (Romania), Street Magazine, Sulfur River Literary Quarterly, The Same, Three Mile Harbor, Universal Oneness Anthology (India), VIA:Voices in Italian Americana (Bordighera Press) Poetry tREnD Anthology (Germany), and The Norton Critical Anthology on Darwin. His work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize on ten occasions. He had a number of his essays published in The New York Times, Newsday, The Easthampton Star and The Shelter Island Reporter. He wrote the obituary of renowned New York poet Samuel Menashe for The Guardian in London in 2011. From 1997-2005 he served as Vice-President of The Walt Whitman Birthplace Association in West Hills, New York where he instituted The Long Island School of Poetry Reading Series and has been Literary Correspondent to Long Island Public Radio where he hosted Poet’s Corner and The Long Island Radio Magazine. He was Vice President of The Ludwig Vogelstein Foundation.

He was profiled on New York Public Television’s Setting the Stage (which was nominated for a New York Emmy Award) and on The Poet and The Poem from The Library of Congress hosted by Grace Cavalieri. He was profiled in the 2009 edition of Poet’s Market. He is a participating writer to The Password Project, an international collaboration between visual artists and writers based in Austria. In 2005 he was appointed Poet Laureate by The Legislature of Suffolk County, New York, the birthplace of Walt Whitman, and served until 2007.

His work has also been translated into Romanian and Spanish, and has been published in Canada, France, Colombia, Austria, Germany, Turkey, Slovenia, Wales, England, Australia, New Zealand, Romania, Italy, South Africa, India, Kosovo, and China. He has been listed in Who’s Who in America (since 2000), The International Who’s Who, The Directory of American Poets and Fiction Writers and The International Who’s Who in Poetry. He is a member of PEN American  and as been ordained a Celebrant by The American Humanist Association. He edited of The Light of City and Sea, An Anthology of Suffolk County Poetry 2006 (Street Press). His collected papers are being archived by Kristen Nyitray at The Department of Special Collections of The Frank Melville Library at Stony Brook University where he also served on The Dean’s Council from 2005-2010. In 2006 he was inducted into The Massapequa High Schools Hall of Fame.. He was judge of the Massachusetts Poetry Out Loud Competition in 2012. He is a founding member of Irish American Writers &Artists. He presently serves as Chair of The Dean’s Advisory Board for the University Libraries at Stony Brook University and as Arts Editor for The Humanist magazine inn Washington, D.C. He was Poetry Editor of Humanist Network News. He is an ordained Humanist Celebrant and served on the Board of The Humanist Society from 2014-2016. He also serves on three committees in New Hampshire which are dedicated to matters of conservation.

He is the Father of Lindsay Alison (b. 1984), Ashley Zurl (b.1987) and Gregory Riordan (b.1990). He and his wife Karen live in Webster, New Hampshire. In 2013, he retired from his position as Clinical Assistant Professor of General Dentistry at Boston University’s Goldman School of Dental Medicine. In 2011, he delivered the school’s Commencement Address and received the Outstanding Faculty Award from The American Student Dental Association. He also received the Outstanding Faculty Award from the graduating class of 2012.  He retired from teaching in 2013. He is also a chair maker, making chairs using the methods and tools used in the 18^th century. One of his chairs is featured on the cover of his new collection, In the Kingdom of Autumn.