The Howard County Poetry and Literature Society (HoCoPoLitSo) is pleased to announce that Steph Sundermann-Zinger of the Baltimore area has been awarded first prize in the 2023 Ellen Conroy Kennedy Poetry Contest for her poem “A Dream of Solitude.” Judges noted the poem’s “gorgeous language” and “strong imagery, alliteration, and meter.” One said, “this poem has the strongest voice,” and another called it “a mature poem that is a moment in time.” A $500 cash prize was awarded, and the poem was published in the Winter 2024 edition of The Little Patuxent Review.

Larraine Denakpo of Columbia was awarded second place with a $100 cash award for her poem “Lullaby for Daughters,” in recognition of the poem’s effective usage of restrained form, while conveying what one judge called “universal resonance.” Another said, “this neatly packed, tiny poem is so enjoyable to read.” In addition, the review panel awarded honorable mentions to Joshua Ward of Dayton for his poem “Some Thrushes on Migration,” and to Eileen Wu of Clarksville for “Why Storms Have Human Names.”

Contest judges evaluated submissions from 60 poets residing throughout Maryland and Virginia for mechanics and technique, clarity, style/music for our contemporary age, imagery/sensory power, and emotional resonance. Each author receiving an award or honorary mention was invited to be interviewed for a blog post hosted at hocopolitso.org.

The Ellen Conroy Kennedy Poetry Prize was established to honor HoCoPoLitSo co-founder Ellen Conroy Kennedy, who passed away in 2020. Ms. Kennedy, who was nominated for the National Book Award in Translation in 1969, translated Francophone African and Caribbean poets, and published her landmark work, The Negritude Poets, in 1975.

Kennedy founded HoCoPoLitSo in 1974, a nationally recognized, community-based nonprofits arts organization that has brought hundreds of writers to Howard County, Maryland, now soon to enter its 50^th year of operation. She served as president and CEO for 30 years, opening her home and sharing her table with an array of literary icons. She also developed and produced The Writing Life, originally a cable television series, featuring conversations with writers, now available free on HoCoPoLitSo’s YouTube channel. In 2019, the Kennedys donated more than 1,500 books, most of which featured authors who read for HoCoPoLitSo audiences, to the Howard Community College library; the Kennedy Collection is housed in a reading room open to the public during normal business hours.

HoCoPoLitSo works to cultivate appreciation for contemporary poetry and literature and celebrate culturally diverse literary heritages. The society sponsors literary readings; the Bauder Writer-in-Residence outreach program to local schools; produces The Writing Life; and partners with the public schools and cultural organizations to support the arts in Howard County, Maryland. For more information, visit www.hocopolitso.org.