Elise Paschen, an enrolled member of the Osage Nation, is the author of Blood Wolf Moon, Tallchief, The Nightlife, Bestiary, Infidelities (winner of the Nicholas Roerich Poetry Prize), and Houses: Coasts. As an undergraduate at Harvard, she received the Garrison Medal for poetry. She holds M.Phil. and D.Phil. degrees from Oxford University. Her poems have been published widely, including Poetry Magazine, The New Yorker, A Norton Anthology of Native Nations Poetry and The Best American Poetry. She has edited or co-edited numerous anthologies, including The Eloquent Poem and The New York Times best-seller, Poetry Speaks. A co-founder of Poetry in Motion, Paschen teaches in the MFA Writing Program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

It was a line from one of Elise’s poems that became the title for both the book & film, “Killers of the Flower Moon.”

Elise is also the daughter of Maria Tallchief – widely considered one of the greatest dancers of the 20th century & America’s first-ever Prima Ballerina.