Joy Harjo – POET WARRIOR Book Launch

Magic City Books and the Tulsa Artist Fellowship are proud to host an in-person book launch celebration for Poet Warrior the new memoir from United States Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo. This free event will take place in person at Guthrie Green on Tuesday, September 7, 2021 at 7:00 pm. Joy will be in conversation with Mvskoke poet and writer, Stacy Pratt.

Joy Harjo is a member of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. She is the author of nine poetry collections, most recently An American Sunrise, and one previous memoir, Crazy Brave. She edited the anthologies When the Light of the World Was Subdued, Our Songs Came Through and Living Nations, Living Words. Named poet laureate of the United States in 2019, she lives in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she is a Tulsa Artist Fellow.

Poet Warrior moves 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.

Guthrie Green is located at 111 E. Reconciliation Way in downtown Tulsa, Oklahoma. There will be no seating provided at the event, guests are encouraged to bring their own lawn chairs and/or blankets for the event. Street parking is free after 5:00 in the Arts District and there are paid parking lots and garages available in the district as well.

Copies of Poet Warrior will be pre-signed by Joy Harjo and available for sale at the event. They are also available for pre-order at https://magiccitybooks.square.site/product/poet-warrior/581. All pre-orders will be available to pick up from Magic City Books on Tuesday September 7 and they are available to ship anywhere in the United States. Additional books by Joy Harjo will also be available for sale at the event and at Magic City Books.

Masks are encouraged at the event and please attend only if you are feeling healthy and showing no ill symptoms.

About Poet Warrior

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.