William Heyen's writing has appeared in numerous literary journals and periodicals, including The New Yorker, The Ontario Review, Harper’s, TriQuarterly, The Georgia Review, Poetry, American Poetry Review, and The Southern Review. His work has also been published in 200 anthologies, in dozens of limited-edition chapbooks and broadsides, and on audio.

His books of poetry include Depth of Field (1970), Noise in the Trees (1974), The Swastika Poems (1977), Long Island Light (1979), Erika: Poems of the Holocaust (1984), Pterodactyl Rose (1991), Crazy Horse In Stillness (1995), Pig Notes & Dumb Music: Prose on Poetry (1998), and Diana, Charles, & the Queen (1998). He also the author of the novel, Vic Holyfield and the Class of ’57 (1986).