Jennifer Elise Foerster

Poet Jennifer Elise Foerster is of German, Dutch, and Mvskoke descent and is a member of the Mvskoke (Creek) Nation of Oklahoma. She earned a BFA from the Institute of American Indian Arts, an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts, and PhD from the University of Denver. She is the author of the poetry collections Leaving Tulsa (2013) and Bright Raft in the Afterweather (2018). Her poems have been anthologized in Sing: Poetry from the Indigenous Americas (2011), New California Writing 2011 (2011), and Turtle Island to Abya Yala (2011).

A former Wallace Stegner Fellow, Foerster has received fellowships from Soul Mountain Retreat, the Naropa Summer Writing Program, the Idyllwild Summer Poetry Program, Dorland Mountain Arts Colony, the Vermont Studio Center, and the National Endowment for the Arts. She co-directs For Girls Becoming, an arts mentorship program for Mvskoke youth in Oklahoma and teaches at the Institute of American Indian Arts low-residency MFA program.