Harvey Hess (February 14, 1939 – July 18, 2012) was an American poet, librettist, educator, arts critic and theologian.

Harvey received early music training, played flute in the Waterloo/Cedar Falls Symphony, and was an amateur countertenor.

He taught English, Creative Writing and Humanities courses at Hawkeye Community College (1992–2007) at Waterloo and the University of Northern Iowa in Cedar Falls (1989–2011).

[6] Harvey specialized in poetry with meter and rhyme systems, lyrics for musical setting, and Japanese poetic forms tanka, senryu and haiku.

[10] He received grants and commissions from the Hawaii State Foundation on Culture and the Arts (1973, 1975, 1979), the National and Hawaii Bicentennial Commissions (1975), Continental Harmony-administered by the American Composers Forum (1999), Summit Choral Society, Akron, Ohio (2000) and the Iowa Arts Council (2002).