Field Party by Joelle Barron

Joelle Barron has made the 2021 CBC Poetry Prize longlist for Field Party.

• 31 writers make the 2021 CBC Poetry Prize longlist

The winner of the 2021 CBC Poetry Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and have the opportunity to attend a two-week writing residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The shortlist will be announced on Nov. 18 and the winner will be announced on Nov. 24.

If you're interested in the CBC Literary Prizes, the CBC Nonfiction Prize opens in January and the CBC Poetry Prize opens in April.

About Joelle Barron

Joelle Barron is a writer and editor living in Fort Frances, Ont. Their first poetry collection, Ritual Lights, was nominated for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award and was a finalist for the Dayne Ogilvie Prize for LGBTQ emerging writers.

Entry in five-ish words

"Northwestern Ontario rite of spring."

The poem's source of inspiration

"This poem is about one of the ways, in my life, that gendered expectations of care met their ultimate conclusion."

First lines

Northern springtime, high school boys in ritual darkness make a pile 
of last year's Christmas trees, swallow their dads' back pills with Budweiser.

About the 2021 CBC Poetry Prize

The winner of the 2021 CBC Poetry Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and attend a two-week writing residency at the Banff Centre for the Arts and Creativity. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The 2022 CBC Nonfiction Prize will open in January. The 2022 CBC Poetry Prize will open in April.