Joy Harjo
American Poet Laureate · United States · On the map · Writers · Born 1951 · age 75
Joy Harjo is an American poet, musician, playwright, and author. She served as the 23rd United States poet laureate from 2019 to 2022, the first Native American to hold that honor. She was also only the second Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to have served three terms.
Joy Harjo is read about 204 times a day, in 20 languages.
A typical day, 30 days to 9 November 2026
The middle day of the days counted, so one week of news cannot move it. The line under it is the last 111 days, one point a day.
Something wrong?A life in dates
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In their own words 4
, Poetry (and other forms of writing) can be useful as a tool for finding the way into or through the dark.
It was all connected, this poetics of listening, word making, and dancing. There was power to transform, to lighten the heaviness of the burden of being human.
Our physical living is held together by plant sacrifice. We eat, wear, and are sheltered by plants and plant material. Nearly all of our medicines are plant-derived.
Awards
About this person
Harjo is a seventh-generation Monahwee daughter. Additionally, Harjo is a citizen of the Muscogee Nation and belongs to Oce Vpofv. She is an important figure in the second wave of the literary Native American Renaissance of the late 20th century. She studied at the Institute of American Indian Arts, completed her undergraduate degree at University of New Mexico in 1976, and earned an MFA degree at the University of Iowa in its creative writing program.
