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Dear readers,
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Over the last six months, Verdant had the pleasure of reading and witnessing established, emerging, and young recounts of vibrancy. The editors and inaugural judge were stunned by ​the drive, promise, and vigour of today's poets. We are inspired by all that our generous poetry and literary community has to offer.
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Please join us in congratulating the winners and finalists of the 2024 Poetry Prize.
*WINNER *
Shiyang Su
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Shiyang Su is a Chinese poet, translator, and an undergrad at UChicago. Her poems can be found or are forthcoming in Frontier Poetry, Glass: A Journal of Poetry, Rattle, Passages North, Diode Poetry Journal, THRUSH, Chestnut Review, Puerto del Sol, Verse Daily, and elsewhere. She was nominated for Best of the Net and Best New Poets. She lives in Chengdu.​​
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"When, in a story that is perhaps apocryphal but nonetheless illuminating, Mozart was asked what his favorite music was, he is said to have replied, 'No music.' By this we do not imagine he meant to convey his distaste for music, but rather his wisdom about it: the notes are there to shape the silences, to give them resonance, even meaning. I have selected "Author's Elegy" as the winner of the 2024 Verdant Poetry Prize because it embodies this wisdom. With sharp images, remarkable form, and deep humanity, it speaks to the silences in our lives, the silences that stretch—at times impassable—between one human life and another, and, with a rare touch of grace, it makes those silences sing."
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—Joseph Fasano
Judge, 2024 Verdant Poetry Prize
* FINALISTS*
Chisom Eze
Miram O'Neal
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Chisom Eze is a writer, poet and artist residing in Port Harcourt. He was a finalist for the 2024 Kofi Awoonor Poetry Prize and his work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Martello Magazine, Healthline Zine, Resurrection Magazine, Akwodee Magazine and Ghost City Review.​​
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Miriam O'Neal has published three collections of poems: We Start With What We're Given (Kelsay Books, 2018), The Body Dialogues (Lily Poetry Review, 2020), & The Half-Said Things (Nixes Mate, 2022). She hosts the longest continuously running poetry reading series south of Boston, Poetry the Art of Words.​​
v is an international literary magazine based in Toronto, Canada, dedicated to showcasing diverse voices and creative expressions since May 2023.
To learn more about our contests, visit Verdant at verdantjournal.ca. Learn more.
The 2024 Contest Judge is Joseph Fasano:
Joseph Fasano is an internationally acclaimed poet, novelist, and teacher. His books of poetry include The Last Song of the World (BOA Editions, 2024), The Crossing (Cider Press Review, 2018), Vincent (CPR, 2015), Inheritance (CPR, 2014), and Fugue for Other Hands (CPR, 2013). His novels include The Swallows of Lunetto (Maudlin House, 2022) and The Dark Heart of Every Wild Thing (Platypus Press, 2022). His honors include the Cider Press Review Book Award, the Rattle Poetry Prize, and a nomination by Linda Pastan for the Poet's Prize, "awarded annually for the best book of verse published by a living American poet two years prior to the award year." His work—which has appeared in The Yale Review, The Southern Review, The Missouri Review, The Times Literary Supplement, Tin House, American Poets Magazine, and other publications—has been widely translated and anthologized, most recently in The Forward Book of Poetry (Faber and Faber). His book of educational/creativity tools, The Magic Words, was released by Penguin Random House/TarcherPerigee in 2024. He teaches at Manhattanville University in New York.