Joan Murray is a poet, writer, and playwright, whose books include: Looking for the Parade (W. W. Norton), Dancing on the Edge and Queen of the Mist (both from Beacon Press), and The Same Water (Wesleyan University Press).

She has contributed poetry, fiction, and essays to such journals as The Atlantic Monthly, Harper's, The Nation, The New York Times, The Paris Review, The Village Voice, and to such anthologies as The Best American Poetry and The Pushcart Prize.

She is also the editor of The Pushcart Book of Poetry and the Poems to Live By anthologies from Beacon. She was commissioned by Broadway's Jujamcyn Theatres, and invited by L.A.'s Mark Taper Forum, to develop Queen of the Mist for the stage.

A repeat guest on NPR's Morning Edition, she is also a National Poetry Series Winner, a National Endowment for the Arts Poetry Fellowship Winner, a Wesleyan New Poets Series Winner, and Winner of Poetry Society of America's Gordon Barber Award.

She has been Poet-in-Residence at the New York State Writers Institute, and has given readings and workshops at hundreds of universities and cultural centers, including the Chautauqua Institution, the International Poetry Forum, and the Lark Theatre in Manhattan.