Quotes by Joy Harjo

Bless the poets, the workers for justice, the dancers of ceremony, the singers of heartache, the visionaries, all makers and carriers of fresh meaning—We will all make it through, despite politics and wars, despite failures and misunderstandings. There is only love.

There is no poetry where there are no mistakes.

To pray you open your whole selfTo sky, to earth, to sun, to moonTo one whole voice that is youAnd know there is moreThat you cant see, cant hearCant know except in momentsSteadly growing, and in languagesThat arent always sound but otherCircles of motion.Like eagle that Sunday morningOver Salt River. Circled in blue skyIn wind, swept our hearts cleanWith sacred wings.We see you, see ourselves and knowThat we must take the utmost careAnd kindness in all things.Breathe in, knowing we are made ofAll this, and breathe, knowingWe are truly blessed because weWere born, and die soon within aTrue circle of motion,Like eagle rounding out the morningInside us.We pray that it will be doneIn beauty.In beauty.

A panther poised in the cypress tree about to jump is apanther poised in a cypress tree about to jump.The panther is a poem of fire green eyes and a heart chargedby four winds of four directions.The panther hears everything in the dark: the unspokentears of a few hundred human years, storms that will breakwhat has broken his world, a bluebird swaying on a branch afew miles away.He hears the death song of his approaching

I wanted to see everything. It was around the time I acquired language, or even before that time, when something happened that changed my relationship to the spin of the world. My concept of language, of what was possible with music was changed by this revelatory moment. It changed even the way I look at the sun.

She had horses who were the blue air of the sky.

I walk in and out of several worlds every day.

All acts of kindness are lights in the war for justice.

I could hear my abandoned dreams making a racket in my soul.

Remember that you are all people and that all people are you.

When you play a sax, that saxophone is irreverent. Its noisy; its a trickster... you cannot hide the saxophone in your hands, so its a good teacher.

I dont see the desert as barren at all; I see it as full and ripe. It doesnt need to be flattered with rain. It certainly needs rain, but it does with what it has, and creates amazing beauty.

The creative act amazes me. Whether its poetry, whether its music, its an amazing process, and it has something to do with bringing forth the old out into the world to create and to bring forth that which will rejuvenate.

“There is no poetry where there are no mistakes.”