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News Release

U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo To Keynote 12th Annual Waterston Desert Writing Prize Ceremony (Photo) - 07/15/26

Waterston award ceremony is set for September 17 at the High Desert Museum

 

BEND, OR—The High Desert Museum is honored to announce that Joy Harjo, the 23rd U.S. Poet Laureate and internationally renowned voice of the Muscogee Nation, will serve as the keynote speaker for the 12th annual Waterston Desert Writing Prize award ceremony.

 

This prestigious award celebrates literary excellence that explores the ecological and cultural narratives of arid landscapes. The winner will receive a $3,000 cash award, a creative residency at PLAYA in Summer Lake, Oregon, and the opportunity to be honored alongside Harjo at the award ceremony on Thursday, September 17. The ceremony includes a book signing following the program. Tickets for the ceremony are $10, with members receiving a 20% discount. To learn more and purchase tickets, visit highdesertmuseum.org/events/waterston-ceremony-2026.

 

“Now in its 12th year, the Waterston Desert Writing Prize continues to elevate stories that honor the complexity of arid landscapes,” says Museum Executive Director Dana Whitelaw, Ph.D. “Having a literary icon like Joy Harjo join us as keynote speaker underscores the national importance of these narratives. We are eager to discover the new voices that will be recognized alongside her this September.”

 

Harjo will also be participating in an upcoming event at the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. As the 23rd United States Poet Laureate, she was the first Native American to hold the position, and only the second poet to be appointed to a third term. Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Harjo is an internationally renowned performer and writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. She is the author of 10 poetry books, several plays and children’s books, and two memoirs.

 

In 2019, Jackson Poetry Prize judges Ada Limón, Alicia Ostriker, and D. A. Powell declared her poetry as work that “speaks not only to the world we live in, but to the unseen world that moves through us, the thread that has connected us all from the start. Harjo’s poems embody a rich physicality and movement; they begin in the ear and the eye, they go on to live and hum inside the body. Throughout her luminous and substantial body of work, there is a sense of timelessness, of ongoingness, of history repeating; these are poems that hold us up to the truth and insist we pay attention.”

 

Harjo’s honors include Yale’s 2023 Bollingen Prize for American Poetry, National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, the Ruth Lily Prize from the Poetry Foundation, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Tulsa Artist Fellowship. She is a former chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and Chair of the Native Arts & Cultures Foundation, and is currently the inaugural Artist-in-Residence for the Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she lives.

 

Harjo will be joined by Guest Judge Charles Hood, winner of the 2025 Obsidian Award and a five-time finalist for the Waterston Desert Writing Prize, at the ceremony.

 

Established in 2014 and inspired by author and Oregon Poet Laureate Ellen Waterston’s love of the High Desert, the Prize celebrates writers whose nonfiction book proposal reflects a similar connection to a desert anywhere in the world.

 

“The Waterston Desert Writing Prize is more than an award; it’s a catalyst for discovery,” said Waterston. “It brings to light new perspectives on everything from the ‘desertification’ of our oceans to the resilience of arid-land flora. Ultimately, it celebrates the timeless power of the desert as a place where we meet ourselves head-on.”

 

Past winners of the Prize include Heather Quinn (2025), Leath Tonino (2024), Anna Welch (2023) and Caroline Tracey (2022). A nonfiction writer and photographer, Quinn’s submission This is How You Disappear is a book-length essay blending personal narrative, reportage and historical research to explore trauma, ecological collapse and memory in the California desert, particularly around the Salton Sea. They were joined by keynote speaker Dan Flores, Ph.D., and guest judge Beth Piatote, Ph.D.

 

The 2026 Waterston Desert Writing Prize winner will be announced on Tuesday, August 18. To learn more about the Waterston Desert Writing Prize, visit highdesertmuseum.org/waterston-prize.

 

ABOUT THE MUSEUM: 

The HIGH DESERT MUSEUM opened in Bend, Oregon in 1982. It brings together wildlife, cultures, art, history and the natural world to convey the wonder of North America’s High Desert. The Museum is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and the Association of Zoos & Aquariums, is a Smithsonian Affiliate, was the 2025 recipient of the Autry Public History Prize from the Western History Association and was a 2021 recipient of the National Medal for Museum and Library Service. To learn more, visit highdesertmuseum.org and follow us on TikTok, Facebook and Instagram. 

 

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Attached Media Files: 23rd U.S. Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo, has been named as the keynote speaker for the 2026 Waterston Desert Writing Prize Ceremony at the High Desert Museum.,

U.S. Poet Laureate Joy Harjo To Keynote 12th Annual Waterston Desert Writing Prize Ceremony (Photo) - 07/15/26

Waterston award ceremony is set for September 17 at the High Desert Museum

 

BEND, OR—The High Desert Museum is honored to announce that Joy Harjo, the 23rd U.S. Poet Laureate and internationally renowned voice of the Muscogee Nation, will serve as the keynote speaker for the 12th annual Waterston Desert Writing Prize award ceremony.

 

This prestigious award celebrates literary excellence that explores the ecological and cultural narratives of arid landscapes. The winner will receive a $3,000 cash award, a creative residency at PLAYA in Summer Lake, Oregon, and the opportunity to be honored alongside Harjo at the award ceremony on Thursday, September 17. The ceremony includes a book signing following the program. Tickets for the ceremony are $10, with members receiving a 20% discount. To learn more and purchase tickets, visit highdesertmuseum.org/events/waterston-ceremony-2026.

 

“Now in its 12th year, the Waterston Desert Writing Prize continues to elevate stories that honor the complexity of arid landscapes,” says Museum Executive Director Dana Whitelaw, Ph.D. “Having a literary icon like Joy Harjo join us as keynote speaker underscores the national importance of these narratives. We are eager to discover the new voices that will be recognized alongside her this September.”

 

Harjo will also be participating in an upcoming event at the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. As the 23rd United States Poet Laureate, she was the first Native American to hold the position, and only the second poet to be appointed to a third term. Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Harjo is an internationally renowned performer and writer of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation. She is the author of 10 poetry books, several plays and children’s books, and two memoirs.

 

In 2019, Jackson Poetry Prize judges Ada Limón, Alicia Ostriker, and D. A. Powell declared her poetry as work that “speaks not only to the world we live in, but to the unseen world that moves through us, the thread that has connected us all from the start. Harjo’s poems embody a rich physicality and movement; they begin in the ear and the eye, they go on to live and hum inside the body. Throughout her luminous and substantial body of work, there is a sense of timelessness, of ongoingness, of history repeating; these are poems that hold us up to the truth and insist we pay attention.”

 

Harjo’s honors include Yale’s 2023 Bollingen Prize for American Poetry, National Book Critics Circle Ivan Sandrof Lifetime Achievement Award, the Ruth Lily Prize from the Poetry Foundation, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and a Tulsa Artist Fellowship. She is a former chancellor of the Academy of American Poets and Chair of the Native Arts & Cultures Foundation, and is currently the inaugural Artist-in-Residence for the Bob Dylan Center in Tulsa, Oklahoma, where she lives.

 

Harjo will be joined by Guest Judge Charles Hood, winner of the 2025 Obsidian Award and a five-time finalist for the Waterston Desert Writing Prize, at the ceremony.

 

Established in 2014 and inspired by author and Oregon Poet Laureate Ellen Waterston’s love of the High Desert, the Prize celebrates writers whose nonfiction book proposal reflects a similar connection to a desert anywhere in the world.

 

“The Waterston Desert Writing Prize is more than an award; it’s a catalyst for discovery,” said Waterston. “It brings to light new perspectives on everything from the ‘desertification’ of our oceans to the resilience of arid-land flora. Ultimately, it celebrates the timeless power of the desert as a place where we meet ourselves head-on.”

 

Past winners of the Prize include Heather Quinn (2025), Leath Tonino (2024), Anna Welch (2023) and Caroline Tracey (2022). A nonfiction writer and photographer, Quinn’s submission This is How You Disappear is a book-length essay blending personal narrative, reportage and historical research to explore trauma, ecological collapse and memory in the California desert, particularly around the Salton Sea. They were joined by keynote speaker Dan Flores, Ph.D., and guest judge Beth Piatote, Ph.D.

 

The 2026 Waterston Desert Writing Prize winner will be announced on Tuesday, August 18. To learn more about the Waterston Desert Writing Prize, visit highdesertmuseum.org/waterston-prize.

 

ABOUT THE MUSEUM: 

The HIGH DESERT MUSEUM opened in Bend, Oregon in 1982. It brings together wildlife, cultures, art, history and the natural world to convey the wonder of North America’s High Desert. The Museum is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization accredited by the American Alliance of Museums and the Association of Zoos & Aquariums, is a Smithsonian Affiliate, was the 2025 recipient of the Autry Public History Prize from the Western History Association and was a 2021 recipient of the National Medal for Museum and Library Service. To learn more, visit highdesertmuseum.org and follow us on TikTok, Facebook and Instagram. 

 

###

 

Attached Media Files: 23rd U.S. Poet Laureate, Joy Harjo, has been named as the keynote speaker for the 2026 Waterston Desert Writing Prize Ceremony at the High Desert Museum.,