Joy Harjo's Blog, page 2

Sherman Chaddlesone Arts and Letters Lecture Series University of Central Oklahoma Pegasus Theater A Reading and Book Signing with Award-Winning Poet Joy Harjo – Co-Sponsored by UCO’s Passport to Native America.

-Indigenous Poet & Memoirist

-PEN USA Literary Award for Nonfiction

-Wallace Stevens Award for Poetry

-NAMMY-winning Musician

Great door prizes!

Reception to follow!

FREE and open to the public!

Campus Address: 100 North University Drive, Edmond, OK 73034

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/events/10406...


Map: pdf

Illinois Blues

Made it to Urbana, Illinois to begin my eight weeks courses. I notice that storms always take the same route when they leave Tulsa. They travel up I-44 to St. Louis, then by the time they get here to Urbana/Champaign, they're colder, punchier. It's definitely colder. I froze all day

I'll be here for a week to get things going, then return for two more meetings. For the most part the courses will

Reach

Good morning from a hot, late Tulsa morning. I miss blogging. I can get on here immediately and write. The WordPress system demands over ten steps, including finding a photograph for every blog, so I have not been blogging except on Facebook. I want to see how many people get this one if I send it out. Please send back a note if you do. Let me know. I want to start again here.

Guns, Winds, and Breath

Last night practiced targets in the garage with a BB gun pistol. The practice reminded me of focus and intent. This morning up at 6:30AM. Went to hardware store for building supplies for a patio build out. Had to load in heavy north winds. They too are focused with intent to get where they are going south of here. I cannot fight them or will be tangled.




...a spiritual teacher told a close

Don't forget to check out Joy Harjo's new blog

Don't forget to check out Joy Harjo's new blog http://www.joyharjo.com/category/blog.
This blog will no longer be used.



Recent Blog Post: http://joyharjo.com/from-my-hotel-roo...
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Moving Blog to www.joyharjo.com

This will be my last post here. Please join me at my Wordpress blog at www.joyharjo.com. I believe you can subscribe there too. Let me know if you have any difficulties. Joy

Witness

Tonight ran by the post office to pick up my mail, an ordinary task in an ordinary world. Polar temperatures have returned; it will be even colder tomorrow. I open a card-sized envelope from my friend Sandra. We have known each other since graduate school at Iowa: we helped each other find a place in what was essentially a far distant country of the mind. We continue to stay in touch, through

Charlie

The last thing Charlie Hill said to me was that he was going to have breakfast with his buddy Floyd Westerman. He'd missed him all the years it had been since Floyd passed over. What helps the grief of losing a best friend, a wise (ass) philosopher, gatherer of stories, a healer, is knowing that he will be there, with Floyd catching up. He'll get some rest, and will be there when the rest of us

Fire

We are each planted with a spark of light.

Each life is like a fire.

We must take care of that light.

Feed it.

Do not let passions for anything we find delight in

Rage and consume us

In any small or large manner

Or we will dim the fire.

It is made of the love of our parents

And ancestors.

It is lit by the Divine within everyone.

We must take care of it.

We each carry light into the

Wrestling

These last few days I have wrestled with difficult parts of my psyche.

It came to me that some of them aren't mine.

The ones in particular I wrestled with were my mother's.

I have to clean them out for myself, and for the generations that follow.


This is quite a profound teaching.