When the World as We Knew It Ended

“An American Sunrise” Joy Harjo (2017)

This poem is a “golden shovel,” a poem that incorporates a new poem into an older poem. The closing lines come from American poet Gwendolyn Brook’s well-known work “We Real Cool.” Harjo’s speaker navigates the complexities of being an American and also a Native American, of being integrated into a culture that has historically oppressed them.

“This Morning I Pray for My Enemies” Joy Harjo (1951)

In this spoken word piece, Harjo plays the saxophone and flute against the words of her poem. Like so much of her work, the poem interrogates the impulse toward violence and division. With the opening line “And whom do I call my enemy?” she asks the reader to turn the mirror on themselves, to question their beliefs.

“A Poem to Get Rid of Fear” Joy Harjo (2010)

Harjo takes a look at fear and how it works in her life. The speaker personifies fear as a separate entity: “I release you, my beautiful and terrible fear” (Line 1). The poem explores how fear has operated in the speaker’s life and how fear too has been afraid. Unlike “When the World as We Knew It Ended,” this poem is more personal, written in the first person. Like “When the World…” the poem uses repetition, metaphor, and personification. It also turns, as so many of Harjo’s poems do, toward hope and letting go of negative emotion.