In 2008, he was elected a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Among his books are For the Sleepwalkers, Wild Gratitude, The Night Parade, Earthly Measures, On Love, Lay Back the Darkness, Special Orders, The Living Fire: New and Selected Poems, and his most recent, Gabriel: A Poem. Hirsch is also the author of several works of prose and he has edited many anthologies as well as the series The Writer’s World. He has taught at Wayne State University and the University of Houston, and is now president of the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.