I am a member of the Muskogee people. I'm a poet, a musician, a dreamer of sorts, a questioner. Like everyone else, I'm looking for answers of some sort or the other.
Joy HarjoRead
Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their families, their histories too. Talk to them, listen to them. They are alive poems.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote emphasizes the interconnectedness of all living beings and the importance of respecting and listening to nature.
Joy Harjo's quote encourages us to acknowledge and value the rich histories and familial connections present in nature. By recognizing that plants, trees, and animals have their own stories and lives, we develop a deeper appreciation for the environment, which she beautifully describes as 'alive poems'—living entities that communicate and resonate with us if we take the time to truly listen.
Themes
NatureConnectionRespectEnvironmentLife
In practice
Example use cases
During a nature walk, I quoted Joy Harjo to inspire others to appreciate the beauty of the environment.
More from Joy Harjo
All quotes →It's important as a writer to do my art well and do it in a way that is powerful and beautiful and meaningful, so that my work regenerates the people, certainly Indian people, and the earth and the sun. And in that way we all continue forever.
Joy HarjoRead
A story matrix connects all of us._x000D_ There are rules, processes, and circles of responsibility in this world. And the story begins exactly where it is supposed to begin. We cannot skip any part.
Joy HarjoRead
You just go where poetry is, whether it's in your heart or your mind or in books or in places where there's live poetry or recordings.
Joy HarjoRead
Bottom line, I have to follow what my soul says, or my spirit. And my spirit said that poetry and the arts should be without borders, should be without political borders.
Joy HarjoRead
I don't like this romanticization of Indian people in which Indian people are looked at as spiritual saviors, as people who have always taken care of the land. We're human beings. But I think different cultures have developed different aspects of humanness.
Joy HarjoRead
Similar quotes
At about 10 o'clock in the morning the sun threw a bright dust-laden bar through one of the side windows and in and out of the beam flies shot like rushing stars.
John SteinbeckRead
Pines a thousand years old. Every year they must go farther for them: they recede, like beavers and Indians, before the white man.
Ralph Waldo EmersonRead
All still when summer is over stand shocks in the field, nothing left to whisper, not even good-bye, to the wind. After summer was over we knew winter would come: we knew silence would wait, tall, patient calm.
William StaffordRead
I've always been more interested in organisms that can move on their own than in stationary plants. But when I canoe or hike along the edge of lakes or oceans and see trees that seem to be growing out of rock faces, I am blown away. How do they do it?
David SuzukiRead
Sometimes I feel like I’m actually on the wrong planet. It’s great when I’m in my garden, but the minute I go out the gate I think, ‘What the hell am I doing here?
George HarrisonRead
The sky is the daily bread of the eyes.
Ralph Waldo EmersonRead