Joy Harjo

Joy Harjo was born in Tulsa, Oklahoma and is a member of the Mvskoke Nation. Her seven books of poetry, which includes such well-known titles as How We Became Human- New and Selected Poems, The Woman Who Fell From the Sky, and She Had Some Horses have garnered many awards. These include the New Mexico Governor’s Award for Excellence in the Arts, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Native Writers Circle of the Americas; and the William Carlos Williams Award from the Poetry Society of America, and Pen America Award for her memoir Crazy Brave. She has produced award-winning CD’s of original music won a Native American Music Award (NAMMY) for Best Female Artist of the Year. She performs nationally and internationally with her band, the Arrow Dynamics, and performs her one-woman show, Wings of Night Sky, Wings of Morning Light, which played at the Wells Fargo Theater in Los Angeles, Public Theater in NYC and La Jolla Playhouse. She has received a Rasmusson US Artists Fellowship and is a founding board member of the Native Arts and Cultures Foundation. Harjo writes a column “Comings and Goings” for her tribal newspaper, the Muscogee Nation News. She lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico.