Catching the Light

Catching the Light - Paperback

$10.95
$10.95
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Catching the Light
  • Catching the Light
Catching the Light - Paperback

Catching the Light - Paperback

by Joy Harjo
$10.95
$10.95
Format
Hardcover $30.00 Paperback $10.95

Book Overview

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.
ISBN9780300274066
Author Joy Harjo
PublisherYale University Press
GenreLiterature
FormatPaperback
PublishedOctober 2023
LanguageENG- English
Pages128
Weight1.0 lb
Target AudienceAdults
Print SizeStandard Print

Related Subjects

Literary Criticism Nonfiction Poetry

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More by Joy Harjo

Catching the Light

Catching the Light - Paperback

Catching the Light - Paperback

By Joy Harjo

About Joy Harjo

Joy Harjo, the 23rd Poet Laureate of the United States, is an internationally renowned performer and writer of the Mvskoke Nation. Harjo is the author of ten books of poetry, several plays, children's books, and two memoirs; she has also produced seven award-winning music albums and edited several anthologies. Her many honors include the Ruth Lily Prize from the Poetry Foundation, the Academy of American Poets Wallace Stevens Award, two NEA fellowships, a Guggenheim Fellowship, the National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, and a Tulsa Artist Fellowship. She is a chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and chair of the Board of Directors of the Native Arts & Cultures Foundation. She lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she is the first artist-in-residence for the Bob Dylan Center. Find her on Twitter at @JoyHarjo and on Instagram at joyharjoforreal.

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