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Newly named poet laureate and Ruth Lilly prize–winner Harjo (Conflict Resolution for Holy Beings) intertwines verse with prose vignettes, oral histories, and flash memoirs in this expressive and generous book.

From the Country’s New Poet Laureate, Poems Reclaiming Tribal Culture

In June, after decades as a significant presence for poetry readers, Joy Harjo was named United States poet laureate.

"In An American Sunrise, Harjo’s 16th book of poetry, released by Norton this week, she continues to bear witness to the violence encountered by Native Americans in the aftermath of Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act. Her words express that the...

"If you read only one book of poems this summer, make it “An American Sunrise” (Norton) by Joy Harjo, the first Native American to be named U.S. poet laureate. In these stunning pages, Harjo, a member of the Muscogee Creek...

"...while the subject matter of her new poems continuously hits you in the gut, Harjo brings a sense of resilience..."

"America may be getting more polarized, but a good way to talk about political issues, she says, is not through political language, which relies on clichés and prohibits people from understanding each other."

"Her poems are accessible and easy to read, but making them no less penetrating and powerful, spoken from a deep and timeless source of compassion for all — but also from a very specific and justified well of anger."

Earlier this summer, the editors of WLT invited more than two dozen writers to nominate one book, published since 1969, that most influenced their extraliterary commitments, along with a brief statement explaining their choice.

"As the book’s title asserts, In Mad...