Poet Warrior
A Memoir
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
National bestseller
An ALA Notable Book
Three-term poet laureate Joy Harjo offers a vivid, lyrical, and inspiring call for love and justice in this contemplation of her trailblazing life.
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.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
This meditative memoir from U.S. poet laureate Joy Harjo—the first Native American in the role—proves that great beauty can exist even in the face of terrible tragedy. Through deeply emotional poetry and heart-rending stories of her life as a member of the Muscogee nation, Harjo deals with the hardships of her youth, as well as stories about her ancestors (including her family’s own history with the infamous Trail of Tears). We were utterly compelled by this poignant collection, from the moment her abusive stepfather prompts her to run away from home as a teen to the optimism and resolve she develops out of her own unthinkable hardships. With a thoughtfully precise writing style, Harjo cuts through to the most raw and vulnerable emotions that lay beneath each story. Elegant, artistic, and powerfully honest, Poet Warrior is an unforgettable window into a remarkable life.
