5th Annual Carmen Ziolkowski Poetry Prize
The judges along with Carmen’s son Jim Ziolkowski are pleased to announce the selected poems for this year’s Carmen Ziolkowski Poetry Prize.
First Prize, $500, donated by Carmen’s family, was awarded to local Sarnia poet Grace Vermeer.
Vermeer’s contemplative poem “A Glimpse of the Afterlife Cento for Carmen” interpreted lines from Carmen’s own poetry book The Moon Before the Sun into innovative images that captured Carmen’s spirit and won over the judges. Carmen’s son, Jim Ziolkowski, was particularly moved: “This is an excellent use for my mom’s poetry and indeed a tribute to my mom.”
Both Second Prize, $250, and Third Prize, $100, were awarded to Stratford Poet Laureate David Stones. Stones’ second prize win “Spring Comes to Kyiv” was memorable for its moving depiction of nature’s resilience amidst human suffering while his third prize win “Hummingbird” conveyed profound observations in small creatures.
Honourable Mentions went to Fizza Abbas, a journalist from Pakistan, for her poem “Bloody Roots,” to Desiree Penner of Manitoba for her poem “When Apricot Light Glazes the Prairies” and to Ingersoll poet Mary Anne Griffiths for her poem “Syntax.”
All of the six winning poems are posted below.
The Uproar Literary Committee is also hosting a reading for past and present contest finalists along with an Open Mic. This will happen during the First Friday activities and will be held at the Lawrence House Centre For The Arts in Sarnia on Friday, August 7, 2026 at 7:00 PM in the Turret Room. Everyone is welcome.
sunday highway
give me a Sunday highway when moms and pops are in some church praying or busy in suburban backyard bbqs when the wolves are cruising beach parking lots or downtown streets when favourite sons are posing at tennis courts and highend malls it’s then that I let the beast run free no one on that
they
they kneel at their pews before the statue of Our Lady in veneration their fingers maneuvering rosary beads reciting the prescribed prayers contemplating the sacred mysteries of each decade they used to be many their voices rising and falling a marian chorus of prayers for the living all sinners waiting for their hour they are
my mother’s table
i kept my mother’s kitchen table eight chairs long, solid wood large enough to hold a feast of plates and all of us to sit around sharing food and lives she made bread upon it, sometimes twice a week and Sicilian sweets none of us could duplicate even with her recipes found handwritten in her
dune dance
we never danced on the beach only walked leaving moonlit footprints eyes open for cherry topped cruisers hunting curfew criminals from weekend teenaged assignations cruising the shadows of canatara silent among the others hearts and breath tripbeating as we spoke words “that had just the right amount of letters. just the right sound”* stolen from
with the sunset behind us
Wendy, the sunset is bathing the stragglers on the beach into orange coloured silhouettes the bend’s summer’s influx of beach bodies empty out onto bars and beer joints their partying continues from sunrise to moonset most of them frat boys and highschoolers searing their summer forever in memory with too much sun, alcohol and one
incense and white wine
1 now in this afternoon as river fog creeps dragging it’s thickness licking us in heavy air in this time that is not time we amenities shall speak of what went unspoken shall see and place the invisible signs . . . . . . afternoon: the whistle summoned its great silence the omnipresent shroud