Writer from Lummi Nation named state’s poet laureate

Rena Priest, a Bellingham writer and member of the Lummi Nation, has become the first Native American poet to serve as Washington’s poet laureate.

Gov. Jay Inslee appointed Priest to be the state’s sixth poet laureate, the Washington State Arts Commission and Humanities Washington announced on Thursday, April 1.

Her two-year term begins April 15.

Priest said she was “excited and honored” by the appointment.

“I’m fascinated by the way people come together around poetry. I am always delighted by how they gather in quiet rooms and let themselves be drawn in, lit up, and transformed by the words of other people,” the Lummi tribal member said in a news release. “It’s a powerful way of connecting.”

Priest succeeds Claudia Castro Luna, the current poet laureate and a Seattle resident.

One of her main goals as poet laureate will be to celebrate poetry in tribal communities in the state.

“There are 29 federally recognized tribes in Washington, composed of 140,714 tribal citizens,” Priest said in the release. “I’m sad to say that in the hundreds of poetry readings I’ve attended over the years, I’ve only met a handful of Native poets. I know that this is not because we don’t exist, but because we don’t have the same access to writing communities as people living in cities and towns.”

She also wants to use poetry to focus attention on the natural world and its protection at a critical juncture.