Catching the Light (Why I Write)

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 insi