Robert Phillips was born in 1938, in Milford, Delaware. Milford was a small, relatively isolated town, and Phillips's upbringing there has had a profound impact on the poetry he has written as an adult. After he received his Master's degree from Syracuse University, Phillips worked in academia for a number of years before going into advertising. His entry into the business world has not kept him from participating in literary activities, however, and in addition to his poetry he has published several works of literary criticism and fiction.

Phillips has so far published four full-length collections of poems: The Pregnant Man (1978), Running on Empty (1981), Personal Accounts: New & Selected Poems 1966-1986 (1986), and Spinach Days (2000). Although he has not been a prolific poet, Phillips has gradually gained critical appreciation for his understated, ironic poetry.

“I’ve never regretted anything that didn’t get accepted for publication,” Phillips has said, “but I have regretted many things that were published…One can spend a whole lifetime trying to evolve one’s true style.”