National Poetry Month

Ada Limón

Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden appointed Ada Limón as the 24th Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress on July 12, 2022 and reappointed her for a historic two-year second term on April 24, 2023. Limón’s second term will begin in September 2023 and conclude in April 2025.

Ada Limón was born in Sonoma, California, in 1976 and is of Mexican ancestry. She is the author of six poetry collections, including “The Hurting Kind,” (Milkweed Editions, 2022), shortlisted for the 2023 Griffin Poetry Prize; “The Carrying” (Milkweed Editions, 2018), which won the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry; “Bright Dead Things” (2015), a finalist for the National Book Award and the National Books Critics Circle Award; “Sharks in the Rivers” (2010); “Lucky Wreck” (Autumn House, 2006); and “This Big Fake World” (Pearl Editions, 2006). She earned a Master of Fine Arts degree from New York University and is the recipient of fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the New York Foundation for the Arts, the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center, and the Kentucky Foundation for Women.

--Library of Congress

"Limón’s poems have been featured in the New York Times , the New Yorker , and the Harvard Review . Her writing has received positive reviews from critics. As poet laureate, Limón created the project “You Are Here: Poetry in the Natural World,” which, in a partnership with the National Park Service, saw the creation of public art installations in national parks throughout the United States. The year 2024 saw Limón serve as editor of a collection of poems of the same name."

--from Salem Press Biographical Encyclopedia

“When people speak about the sense of wonder in my work, I get a quick little thrill. I just love the word ‘wonder.’ Let's wonder. Let's be in wonder. I am amazed. Most of the time. Just amazed at the world. All of the agony and pain and beauty and forgiveness,” Limón told a Frontal Junkyard interviewer. “You know, some days, it's just good to be alive, and so you go write a poem about it. And some days it's hard to be alive, and so you go write a poem about that. But as long as you are writing, you're celebrating breath and being. You're sticking your arms up and waving, making your own revolution, that's the magic of it all.”"

--from Gale Literature: Contemporary Authors

Image of Limón shared in the Public Domain by the Library of Congress

Ada Limón -- "A Poet's Take on Looking to Language for Radical Hope"

Watch in library resource: Films on Demand.