Media: Interviews, Reviews, Articles

"I take an abiding pleasure in knowing that Joy Harjo is the poet laureate of the United States. After all, Harjo—a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation and the first Native American to be so honored—speaks for an America I...

Newly named poet laureate and Ruth Lilly prize–winner Harjo (Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings) intertwines verse with prose vignettes, oral histories, and flash memoirs in this expressive and generous book.

"Harjo, though very much a poet of America, extracts from her own personal and cultural touchstones a more galactal understanding of the world, and her poems become richer for it." —The New Yorker

Joy Harjo, the first Native American U.S. poet laureate, tells TIME about her new book, ‘An American Sunrise,’ and the state of poetry.

From the Country’s New Poet Laureate, Poems Reclaiming Tribal Culture

In June, after decades as a significant presence for poetry readers, Joy Harjo was named United States poet laureate.

"In An American Sunrise, Harjo’s 16th book of poetry, released by Norton this week, she continues to bear witness to the violence encountered by Native Americans in the aftermath of Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act. Her words express that the...

"If you read only one book of poems this summer, make it “An American Sunrise” (Norton) by Joy Harjo, the first Native American to be named U.S. poet laureate. In these stunning pages, Harjo, a member of the Muscogee Creek...

"...while the subject matter of her new poems continuously hits you in the gut, Harjo brings a sense of resilience..."

"America may be getting more polarized, but a good way to talk about political issues, she says, is not through political language, which relies on clichés and prohibits people from understanding each other."