The 2021 Poetry Awards Judge's Report
Poet Dr Majella Cullinane was the judge of the Caselberg International Poetry Prize 2021
The Caselberg’s International Poetry Prize Awards Night was held at the University Bookshop on Thursday 25 November 2021 — this years guest judge was poet Majella Cullinane — following is her report which, along with the winning poems, have been published in Landfall 242. A booklet comprising the winning poems and judges report for 2021 are available here.
Irrespective of a judge’s particular tastes, there are elements which make a poem rise to the top: the careful craft of language, rhythm, clarity, and originality, especially in terms of imagery and voice. The subject matter of entries was broad: political and social commentary on recent events in Aotearoa, nature, love, ghosts, death and identity. Many poems had striking lines, but were let down because the tone or rhythm was sporadic, or the observation clichéd. Others suffered from poor line endings or opaque language that rendered them difficult to connect with. Many would have benefited from closer editing and precision – often ‘less is more.’ The use of, or lack of punctuation is a controversial topic in contemporary poetry. While poems can work without it, a blanket lack of punctuation that ultimately impedes or jars the reader is best avoided.
Winner
Sea-skins drew me back again and again with its inventive language, and the assuredness of its voice. The leaps of imagination between stanzas, between the ordinary and extraordinary are surprising and original:
A physician displayed my skins on a bulletin board,/stuck pins in the scabs, voodoo style/He banished me to a moonless sea, told me I was a sinking boat,…
Runner Up
Kintsukuroi
A list poem on the nature of grief, for its combination of startling nature imagery and emotional insight:
And what of the swifts that dazzle in aerobatic flight? That pierce the twilight with elfin screams and finally rest in lofts and spires?
Highly commended
At Bluecliffs – A carefully drawn narrative poem that charts a day fishing:
a Fiordland lake where big trout lined the shore/like wallflowers at a dance…
Inversion Layers, Hāwea – A meticulously crafted poem with some lovely examples of personification:
May is a swindler. May sells promises of yellow flowers/upturned towards the light,…
Kōanga Ngākau – An ambitious poem with a bustling energy, and striking imagery:
the caress of a kaitiaki checking out my inner ear/ and (…) Frost began to spread across her blood-white flowers,…
Ode to L – With its confident, engaging voice, this is a poignant lyric on a woman’s sexual identity:
(…) I was already a foot taller/ and had a longer stride/and lesbian was me and mine/…
The domestic assistant – Struck me for its assertive, unapologetic pronouncement of identity:
she is a staccato fiddle in the legato violins,// sweeps and dusts in tantalising silences, leaves her mauri in every room,…