“My role as a poet is as a healer,” says Joy Harjo. “Poetry is a healing force.”
The 68-year-old Native American writer first felt that restorative power during a difficult time early in her life. "Poetry came to me at a point in which I had no words to express the depth of experience of being Native in this country," she says.
Now Harjo has a chance to offer that medicine to the whole nation. She was appointed 23rd Poet Laureate of the United States Wednesday. As a member of the Muscogee Nation, she will be the first Native American to serve in that honorary position when she begins this fall.