Denise Lajimodiere, an enrolled citizen of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa, Belcourt, has been appointed as North Dakota’s next Poet Laureate, the North Dakota Council on the Arts (NDCA) announced Wednesday. The North Dakota Legislature passed a Senate Concurrent Resolution naming Lajimodiere to this honorary position, effective July 2023.

Lajimodiere will serve a two-year term through June 2025. She succeeds Larry Wiowode, who died April 28, 2022.

North Dakota has named a Poet Laureate since 1957. The honorary post promotes reading, writing and an appreciation of poetry through public appearances and teaching opportunities across the state.

Lajimodiere has been involved in education for 44 years as an elementary teacher, principal and professor, earning her bachelor’s, master’s and doctorate degrees from the University of North Dakota in Grand Forks. Lajimodiere is a retired associate professor from the School of Education, Education Leadership program, North Dakota State University, Fargo.

She is one of the founders of the National Native American Boarding School Healing Coalition (N-NABS-HC). She is a poet, producing “Dragonfly Dance,” “Thunderbird,” “Bitter Tears” and “His Feathers were Chains.” She is an academic book author, producing “Stringing Rosaries: The History, The Unforgivable, The Healing of North Plains Boarding School Survivors,” and is author of the children’s book “Josie Dances.”

Lajimodiere is a traditional jingle dress dancer, Ojibwe Birch Bark Biting artist and lives on the Turtle Mountain Reservation.

Previous N.D. Poet Laureates include Corbin A. Waldron and Associate Poet Laureates Henry R. Martinson and Lydia O. Jackson. Larry Woiwode was designated the N.D. Poet Laureate for life in 1985 and served for 37 years. He named the following Associate Poet Laureates: Jamie Parsley, Rick Watson, Dave Solheim, Shadd Piehl, Madelyn Camrud, Heid Erdrich, Louise Erdrich, Warren Sturlaugson, Mark Vinz, Bonnie Larson Staiger and Lajimodiere. a