Joy Harjo

"To know ourselves is the most profound and difficult endeavor. Though we are all made of the same questions, we have individual routes to the answers, or to reframing the questions. Why is there evil in the world? Why do people suffer, and some more than others? Why are we here? What are we doing here? What happens after death? Does anything mean anything at all? Who am I and what does it matter?" writes Joy Harjo, renowned poet and activist, in this profound work about the struggles, challenges, and joys of coming of age.In her best-selling memoir Poet Warrior, Harjo led readers through her lifelong process of artistic evolution. In Girl Warrior, she speaks directly to Native girls and women, sharing stories about her own coming of age to bring renewed attention to the pivotal moments of becoming including forgiveness, failure, falling, rising up, and honoring our vast family of beings.Informed by her own experiences and those of her ancestors, Harjo offers inspiration and insight for navigating the many challenges of maturation. She grapples with parents, friendships, love, and loss. She guides young readers toward painting, poetry, and music as powerful tools for developing their own ethical sensibility. As Harjo demonstrates, the act of making is an essential part of who we are, a means of inviting the past into the present and a critical tool young women can use to shape a more just future. Lyrical and compassionate, Harjo's call for creativity and empathy is an urgent and necessary work.

A baby girl is welcomed to the breathing world by generations of her family and set on the magnificent journey of becoming. As she grows, she is reminded of her connections to the natural world; to her family, her ancestors, her neighbors; to the source of all magic and sorrow--and of her responsibility to uphold and honor those connections.With US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo's transcendent verse and Pura Belpr Award winner Adriana Garcia's monumental illustrations, For a Girl Becoming acts as a blessing and a harbinger for a young girl's life--and reminds those of us who still stand at the door of becoming that it is our relationships with nature and with each other that carry us through it.

A beautifully illustrated edition of Poet Laureate Joy Harjo's poem "Washing My Mother's Body," which offers a way through grief when the loss appears unbearable. As I wash my mother's face, I tell herhow beautiful she is, how brave, how her beauty and braverylive on in her grandchildren. Her face is relaxed, peaceful.Her earth memory body has not left yet, but when I see her the next day, embalmed and in the casketin the funeral home, it will be gone.Where does it go? Through lyrical prose and evocative watercolor illustrations by award-winning Muscogee artist Dana Tiger, Washing My Mother's Body explores the complexity of a daughter's grief as she reflects on the joys and sorrows of her mother's life. She lays her mother to rest in the landscape of her memory, honoring the hands that raised her, the body that protected her, and the legs that carried her mother through adversity. Moving, comforting, and deeply emotional, Washing My Mother's Body is a tender look at mother-daughter relationships, the complexity of grieving the loss of a parent, and the enduring love of those left behind.

“The poems in this collection began as a search for a history of my ancestors in a small, isolated valley in northern New Mexico. But no one wrote it down, and I was left to construct a poetic history where there were no written records . . .”Leo Romero stands as a foundational figure in Latino letters. With six books of poetry and a book of short fiction to his name, Romero’s contribution to the literary canon is profound and enduring. Bringing together for the first time his new and selected poems, Trees Dream of Water reflects Romero’s journey from youth to maturity as a person and a poet, and his deep connection to New Mexico and its culture. Traversed by memory, myth, and observation of the natural world, these poems explore family, community belonging and conflict, life as an artist, and the cycles of life and death. This lyrical anthology includes accompanying essays to illuminate Romero’s life and work for longtime admirers and new readers alike.

No one played like Jesse Ed Davis. One of the most sought-after guitarists of the late 1960s and ’70s, Davis appeared alongside the era’s greatest stars—John Lennon and Mick Jagger, B.B. King and Bob Dylan—and contributed to dozens of major releases, including numerous top-ten albums and singles, and records by artists as distinct as Johnny Cash, Taj Mahal and Cher. But Davis, whose name has nearly disappeared from the annals of rock and roll history, was more than just the most versatile session guitarist of the decade. A multitalented musician who paired bright flourishes with soulful melodies, Davis transformed our idea of what rock music could be and, crucially, who could make it. At a time when few other Indigenous artists appeared on concert stages, radio waves, or record store walls, in a century often depicted as a period of decline for Native Americans, Davis and his Kiowa, Comanche, Cheyenne, Seminole and Mvskoke relatives demonstrated new possibilities for Native people. Weaving together more than a hundred interviews with Davis’s bandmates, family members, friends and peers—among them Jackson Browne, Bonnie Raitt and Robbie Robertson—Washita Love Child powerfully reconstructs Davis’s extraordinary life and career, taking us from his childhood in Oklahoma to his first major gig backing rockabilly star Conway Twitty, and from his dramatic performance at George Harrison’s 1971 Concert for Bangladesh to his years with John Trudell and the Grafitti Man band. In Davis’s story, a post-Beatles Lennon especially emerges as a kindred soul and creative partner. Yet Davis never fully recovered from Lennon’s sudden passing, meeting his own tragic demise just eight years later. With a foreword by former poet laureate Joy Harjo, who collaborated with Davis near the end of his life, Washita Love Child thoroughly and finally restores the “red dirt boogie brother” to his rightful place in rock history, cementing his legacy for generations to come.

National Humanities Medalist and U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo examines the power of words and how poetry summons us toward justice and healing “Her enduring message—that writing can be redemptive—resonates: ‘To write is to make a mark in the world, to assert “I am.”’ The result is a rousing testament to the power of storytelling.”—Publishers Weekly “Harjo writes as if the creative journey has been the destination all along.”—Kirkus Reviews In this lyrical meditation about the why of writing poetry, Joy Harjo reflects on significant points of illumination, experience, and questioning from her fifty years as a poet. Composed of intimate vignettes that take us through the author’s life journey as a youth in the late 1960s, a single mother, and a champion of Native nations, this book offers a fresh understanding of how poetry functions as an expression of purpose, spirit, community, and memory—in both the private, individual journey and as a vehicle for prophetic, public witness. Harjo insists that the most meaningful poetry is birthed through cracks in history from what is broken and unseen. At the crossroads of this brokenness, she calls us to watch and listen for the songs of justice for all those America has denied. This is an homage to the power of words to defy erasure—to inscribe the story, again and again, of who we have been, who we are, and who we can be.

A groundbreaking survey of contemporary Indigenous art and its enduring connections to the landThe Land Carries Our Ancestors: Contemporary Art by Native Americans brings together works by many of today’s most boldly innovative Native American artists. Jaune Quick-to-See Smith, one of the leading artists and curators of her generation, has carefully chosen some fifty works across a diversity of practices—including weaving, beadwork, sculpture, painting, printmaking, drawing, photography, performance, and video—that share the common thread of the land.This beautifully illustrated book features both well-known and emerging artists, from G. Peter Jemison (Seneca Nation of Indians, Heron Clan) and Kay WalkingStick (Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma/European descent) to Eric-Paul Riege (Diné) and Rose B. Simpson (Pueblo of Santa Clara, New Mexico). Smith brings her personal perspective to the Native American experience and Indigenous connections to the land. In her essay, heather ahtone examines the history and practices of landscape art, shedding light on how it is both a tool for self-expression and a means to understanding the natural world. Celebrated poet and memoirist Joy Harjo pays homage to the land in her poem “Once the World Was Perfect.” Shana Bushyhead Condill discusses the themes and practices that distinguish these artworks.The Land Carries Our Ancestors: Contemporary Art by Native Americans shares new perspectives on these visionary and provocative artists while offering a timely celebration of contemporary Indigenous art.Published in association with the National Gallery of Art, Washington, DCExhibition ScheduleNational Gallery of Art, Washington, DCSeptember 22, 2023–January 15, 2024New Britain Museum of American Art, New Britain, ConnecticutApril 18–September 15, 2024

US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo's iconic poem "Remember," illustrated by Caldecott Medalist Michaela Goade, invites young readers to pause and reflect on the wonder of the world around them, and to remember the importance of their place in it. Remember the sky you were born under, Know each of the star's stories. Remember the moon, know who she is. Remember the sun's birth at dawn, That is the strongest point of time. So begins the picture book adaptation of the renowned poem that encourages young readers to reflect on family, nature, and their heritage. In simple and direct language, Harjo, a member of the Mvskoke Nation, urges readers to pay close attention to who they are, the world they were born into, and how all inhabitants on earth are connected. Michaela Goade, drawing from her Tlingit culture, has created vivid illustrations that make the words come alive in an engaging and accessible way. This timeless poem paired with magnificent paintings makes for a picture book that is a true celebration of life and our human role within it.

THE NATIONAL BESTSELLER - AN AMERICAN INDIAN LIBRARY ASSOCIATION HONOR BOOK - A BOSTON GLOBE-HORN BOOK HONOR AWARD - NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY School Library Journal - Publishers Weekly - The Horn Book - NPR - The Bulletin - Kirkus Reviews US Poet Laureate Joy Harjo's iconic poem "Remember," illustrated by Caldecott Medalist Michaela Goade, invites young readers to pause and reflect on the wonder of the world around them, and to remember the importance of their place in it. Remember the sky you were born under, Know each of the star's stories. Remember the moon, know who she is. Remember the sun's birth at dawn, That is the strongest point of time. So begins the picture book adaptation of the renowned poem that encourages young readers to reflect on family, nature, and their heritage. In simple and direct language, Harjo, a member of the Mvskoke Nation, urges readers to pay close attention to who they are, the world they were born into, and how all inhabitants on earth are connected. Michaela Goade, drawing from her Tlingit culture, has created vivid illustrations that make the words come alive in an engaging and accessible way. This timeless poem paired with magnificent paintings makes for a picture book that is a true celebration of life and our human role within it.

Over a long, influential career in poetry, Joy Harjo has been praised for her "warm, oracular voice" (John Freeman, Boston Globe) that speaks "from a deep and timeless source of compassion for all" (Craig Morgan Teicher, NPR). Her poems are musical, intimate, political, and wise, intertwining ancestral memory and tribal histories with resilience and love.In this gemlike volume, Harjo selects her best poems from across fifty years, beginning with her early discoveries of her own voice and ending with moving reflections on our contemporary moment. Generous notes on each poem offer insight into Harjo's inimitable poetics as she takes inspiration from Navajo horse songs and jazz, reckons with home and loss, and listens to the natural messengers of the earth. As evidenced in this transcendent collection, Joy Harjo's "poetry is light and elixir, the very best prescription for us in wounded times" (Sandra Cisneros, Millions).

Joy Harjo, the first Native American to serve as US poet laureate, invites us to travel along the heartaches, losses, and humble realisations of her “poet-warrior” road. A musical, kaleidoscopic and wise follow-up to Crazy Brave (ISBN 978 0 393 34543 8), Poet Warrior reveals how Harjo came to write poetry of compassion and healing, poetry with the power to unearth the truth and demand justice. Harjo listens to stories of ancestors and family, the poetry and music that she first encountered as a child and the messengers of a changing earth—owls heralding grief, resilient desert plants and a smooth green snake curled up in surprise. She celebrates the influences that shaped her poetry, among them Audre Lorde, N. Scott Momaday, Walt Whitman, Muscogee stomp dance call-and-response, Navajo horse songs, rain and sunrise. In absorbing, incantatory prose, Harjo grieves at the loss of her mother, reckons with the theft of her ancestral homeland and sheds light on the rituals that nourish her as an artist, mother, wife and community member. Moving fluidly between prose, song and poetry, Harjo recounts a luminous journey of becoming, a spiritual map that will help us all find home. Poet Warrior sings with the jazz, blues, tenderness and bravery that we know as distinctly Joy Harjo.

Joy Harjo, the first Native American to serve as U.S. poet laureate, invites us to travel along the heartaches, losses, and humble realizations of her poet-warrior road. A musical, kaleidoscopic, and wise follow-up to Crazy Brave, Poet Warrior reveals how Harjo came to write poetry of compassion and healing, poetry with the power to unearth the truth and demand justice.Harjo listens to stories of ancestors and family, the poetry and music that she first encountered as a child, and the messengers of a changing earth--owls heralding grief, resilient desert plants, and a smooth green snake curled up in surprise. She celebrates the influences that shaped her poetry, among them Audre Lorde, N. Scott Momaday, Walt Whitman, Muscogee stomp dance call-and-response, Navajo horse songs, rain, and sunrise. In absorbing, incantatory prose, Harjo grieves at the loss of her mother, reckons with the theft of her ancestral homeland, and sheds light on the rituals that nourish her as an artist, mother, wife, and community member.Moving fluidly between prose, song, and poetry, Harjo recounts a luminous journey of becoming, a spiritual map that will help us all find home. Poet Warrior sings with the jazz, blues, tenderness, and bravery that we know as distinctly Joy Harjo.

In the second memoir from the first Native American to serve as US poet laureate, Joy Harjo invites us to travel along the heartaches, losses and humble realisations of her “poet-warrior” road. A musical, kaleidoscopic meditation, Poet Warrior reveals how Harjo came to write poetry of compassion and healing, poetry with the power to unearth the truth and demand justice. Weaving together the voices that shaped her, Harjo listens to stories of ancestors and family, the poetry and music that she first encountered as a child, the teachings of a changing earth and the poets who paved her way. She explores her grief at the loss of her mother and sheds light on the rituals that nourish her as an artist, mother, wife and community member. Moving fluidly among prose, song and poetry, Poet Warrior is a luminous journey of becoming that sings with all the jazz, blues, tenderness and bravery that we know as distinctly Joy Harjo.

Tashi Powers' unique, practical guide on using your everyday location to attract abundance, health, and well-being is destined to become a modern astrology classic. Drawing from both Eastern and Western world traditions including Vedic and Evolutionary Astrology, her original approach also includes secret wisdom from feng shui, Vastu Shastra, geomancy, the ley line system, and sacred compass directions-all presented in a beautifully relatable, visually stunning format.

Joy Harjo's play Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light is the centerpiece of this collection that includes essays and interviews concerning the roots and the reaches of contemporary Native Theater. Harjo blends storytelling, music, movement, and poetic language in Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light—a healing ceremony that chronicles the challenges young protagonist Redbird faces on her path to healing and self-determination. This text is accompanied by interviews with Native theater artists Rolland Meinholtz and Randy Reinholz, as well as an interview with Harjo, conducted by Page. The interviews highlight the lives and contributions of Meinholtz, a theater artist and educator who served as the drama instructor at the Institute of American Indian Arts from 1964–70 and a close mentor and friend to Harjo; and Reinholz, producing artistic director of Native Voices at the Autry, the nation's only Equity theater company dedicated exclusively to the development and production of new plays by Native American, First Nations, and Alaska Native playwrights. The new interview with Harjo focuses on her experiences working in theater. Essays on Harjo's work are provided by Mary Kathryn Nagle—an enrolled citizen of the Cherokee nation, playwright, and attorney who shares her insights on the legal and historical frameworks through which we can better understand the significance of Harjo's play; and Priscilla Page—writer, performer, and educator (of Wiyot heritage), who looks at indigenous feminism, jazz, and performance as influences on Harjo's theatrical work.

In the early 1800s, the Mvskoke people were forcibly removed from their original lands east of the Mississippi to Indian Territory, which is now part of Oklahoma. Two hundred years later, Joy Harjo returns to her family’s lands and opens a dialogue with history. In An American Sunrise, Harjo finds blessings in the abundance of her homeland and confronts the site where her people, and other indigenous families, essentially disappeared. From her memory of her mother’s death, to her beginnings in the native rights movement, to the fresh road with her beloved, Harjo’s personal life intertwines with tribal histories to create a space for renewed beginnings. Her poems sing of beauty and survival, illuminating a spirituality that connects her to her ancestors and thrums with the quiet anger of living in the ruins of injustice. A descendent of storytellers and “one of our finest—and most complicated—poets” (Los Angeles Review of Books), Joy Harjo continues her legacy with this latest powerful collection.

This early collection of Achtenberg's poetry treats the intersection of the inner and the outer life through issues of social justice that remain crucial, and the ways history and its traumas sit in us. Her themes include women's rights, poverty, war, racism, and sexual abuse. Her vision of concern spans the world, from her own inner city neighborhoods to the wider world, anywhere people are oppressed. "I can't tell you how wonderful and naked these poems are and a rare thing for a woman to be able to give it. What you are writing is not just something for this day you are wringing ringing out a cry you are privy to a great cry out a wonderful vision of a woman's agony. You have a witch's terrible straight look and you must go on with this vision . . . to show the utter depravity and cruelty of the oppressors, amidst screams of destruction, the past and future hiroshimas. This is the poetry of our resurrection. For the blood, for the healing. For love." -- Meridel Le Sueur (excerpts from letters to the author) "I didn't know how much I needed this book until I read it. And I didn't know how much I'd been longing for a northamerican poetry that speaks with passion and authority of both the inner and outer life, as well as the point where they intersect; that place that is 'political' understood in its most fierce and fearful, sad and triumphant sense. Achtenberg's eye for detail is accurate and often startling, both compassionate and ironic; the rhythms of her language are resonant and complex beyond what we have come to expect from northamerican poetry. Anya Achtenberg's poetry gives both pleasure and courage." -- Jim Moore, author of Invisible Strings ANYA ACHTENBERG is an award-winning author of the novel Blue Earth, and novella, The Stories of Devil-Girl (both with Modern History Press); and poetry books, The Stone of Language (West End Press 2004; MHP 2020); and I Know What the Small Girl Knew (Holy Cow Press; MHP 2020). Her fiction and poetry have received numerous prizes and distinctions, and been published in numerous literary journals, including Harvard Review; Malpaís Review; Gargoyle; Tupelo Quarterly; Hinchas de poesía; Poet Lore; and many more. Learn more at TheDisobedientWriter.comFrom Modern HIstory Press www.ModernHistoryPress.com

In the early 1800s, the Mvskoke people were forcibly removed from their original lands east of the Mississippi to Indian Territory, which is now part of Oklahoma. Two hundred years later, Joy Harjo returns to her family’s lands and opens a dialogue with history. In An American Sunrise, Harjo finds blessings in the abundance of her homeland and confronts the site where her people, and other indigenous families, essentially disappeared. From her memory of her mother’s death, to her beginnings in the native rights movement, to the fresh road with her beloved, Harjo’s personal life intertwines with tribal histories to create a space for renewed beginnings. Her poems sing of beauty and survival, illuminating a spirituality that connects her to her ancestors and thrums with the quiet anger of living in the ruins of injustice. A descendent of storytellers and “one of our finest—and most complicated—poets” (Los Angeles Review of Books), Joy Harjo continues her legacy with this latest powerful collection.

Poetry, Short Stories, Nonfiction, Photos, Art and Book Reviews by Daniel Barnum-Swett, Tony Barnstone, Austin Bennett, Kimberley Blaeser, Chris Bullard, .chisaroakwu., Stewe Claeson, Chard DeNiord, Ty Dettioff, Richard Dinges, Anita Endrezze, Michele Feeney, Courtney Felle, Ann Fisher-Wirth, Jerry Gates, Julia Mary Gibson, Jenn Givhan, Joy Harjo, Elizabeth Hellstern, Sandra Hunter, Richard Jackson, Patricia Spears Jones, Whitney Judd, Sarah Kaminski, Barry Kitterman, Joan Larkin, Angela LaVoie, Sara Levine, Jennifer Martelli, Tim Miller, Patricia Colleen Murphy, Naomi Shihab Nye, Martin Penman, Samuel Piccone, Herbert Plummer, Sarah Priestman, Maj Ragain, Linsey Royce, Anele Rubin, David St. John, Sarah Elizabeth Schantz, Danielle Sellers, Art Smith, Jane Hipkins Sobie, Meredith Striker, Melissa Studdard, Emma Claire Sweeney, John Tait, Shelly Taylor, Marina Tsvetayeva, Heidi Vanderbilt, George Wallace, Donley Watt, Patricia Jabbeh Wesley, Ann Leshy Wood