A StFX student, Lauren Seamone, is the winner of this year’s Atlantic Canada Undergraduate Poetry Competition.
Ms. Seamone, who has since graduated from StFX with a Bachelor of Arts degree in history, was recognized for her poem “Gaza is on fire and I’m reading a science fiction novel in the library.” Her winning poem will be published in The Antigonish Review, one of the oldest continuing literary magazines in Canada that has published the works of Marshall McLuhan, Margaret Atwood, Rohinton Mistry, Sheree Fitch and many others. She will also receive $200.
Ms. Seamone, who also played varsity soccer during her four years at StFX, says her initial reaction to winning this contest was shock since she’s never shared her poetry with anyone before except for her creative writing professor, Dr. Douglas Smith, and her classmates.
“Now that I’ve let the win sink in, I feel grateful that the poem I wrote resonated with the judges and that my family and friends are more aware of my passion for writing.”
Poetry, and writing in general, is something she’s done since she was around six or seven years of age. “Very few people knew that I wrote poetry, in fact my roommates and friends had no idea I did until I won the poetry contest,” says Ms. Seamone who will take a Bachelor of Elementary Education at Mount St. Vincent University in the fall, where she will also play soccer.
“The contest appealed to me since I’m really attempting to get my work into the public sphere, which is not an easy thing to do. It creates a vulnerability that I think I’m ready to immerse myself in.”
The Atlantic Canada Undergraduate Poetry Competition was run by the StFX English society (co-presidents are Renee Papp and Ciara Wainwright, with faculty supervisors Dr. Kailin Wright and Dr. Laura Estill).
Honourable mention in the contest went to Julie Webb for the poem “Entrenched” and to Jessica Farquharson for “Around the Prairie Sun.”
