CBC Books, CBC’s online home for literary content, together with its partners the Canada Council for the Arts and Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, today announced Jordan Redekop-Jones of Vancouver as the winner of the 2025 CBC Poetry Prize. Redekop-Jones’s poem, Mixed Girl as Cosmogonic Myth, was selected from more than 3,200 entries.
As the grand-prize winner, Redekop-Jones will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, a two-week writing residency at Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity and her poem has been published on CBC Books. Redekop-Jones will discuss her winning poem on Bookends with Mattea Roach. The interview will air at a later date on CBC Radio and CBC Listen.
“Winning this award means so much to me," said Redekop-Jones. "I am overcome with immense gratitude for the judges and readers that took the time to read my work in such a respectful and compassionate manner. At the moment, I am still trying to process this experience and what it means to me as an artist. It is a dream come true."
The 2025 CBC Poetry Prize jurors Carol Rose GoldenEagle, Paul Vermeersch and Britta B., said this about Redekop-Jones’s poem:
“In Redekop-Jones’s poem Mixed Girl as Cosmogonic Myth, a daughter seeks, and speaks to, her disappearing mother. The speaker never addresses the audience directly, but what we overhear is both astonishing and tender. The poet uses syntax the way composers arrange motifs in a symphony. The effect is otherworldly, but grounded in our world, like an alien intelligence translated into English. Fragile and innocent, but with an abundant and underlying strength, this poem resonates on a deeply emotional level, and we are eager to read more from this poet, and to see what this energetic work might spark in other writers, as well.”
The four runners-up for the 2025 CBC Poetry Prize, who will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, are: Jennifer Manuel of Duncan, B.C. for Hold for the Next Available Me; Brad Aaron Modlin of Montreal for Mice, Toads, Peacocks; Carly Straker of Yellowknife for Northern Girls and Jan A. Wozniak of Toronto for Memory Palace of the One-Track Oracle.
The winner of the Prix de poésie Radio-Canada 2025 was also announced: Caroline Moffet for Une craque dans le plywood ou l'anatomie d'une fissure. More information is available at ICI.Radio-canada.ca/icionlit.
For more information on the CBC Literary Prizes, please visit CBCBooks.ca.
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About CBC Books
Home to Canada Reads, Bookends with Mattea Roach, The Next Chapter with Antonio Michael Downing, and the CBC Literary Prizes, CBC Books connects Canadians with books, encouraging a shared love of reading and writing. For book news, reading lists, author interviews and more, visit cbcbooks.ca
About CBC/Radio-Canada
CBC/Radio-Canada is Canada’s national public broadcaster. Through our mandate to inform, enlighten and entertain, we play a central role in strengthening Canadian culture. As Canada’s trusted news source, we offer a uniquely Canadian perspective on news, current affairs and world affairs. Our distinctively homegrown entertainment programming draws audiences from across the country. Deeply rooted in communities, CBC/Radio-Canada offers diverse content in English, French and eight Indigenous languages: Dëne Sųłıné, Dene Kǝdǝ́, Dene Zhatıé, Eastern Cree, Dinjii Zhuʼ Ginjik, Inuktitut, Inuvialuktun and Tłı̨chǫ. We also deliver content in Spanish, Arabic, Chinese, Punjabi and Tagalog, as well as both official languages, through Radio Canada International (RCI). We are leading the transformation to meet the needs of Canadians in a digital world.
About Canada Council for the Arts
The Canada Council for the Arts is Canada’s public arts funder, with a mandate to “foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts.”
The Council’s grants, services, initiatives, prizes, and payments contribute to the vibrancy of a creative and diverse arts and literary scene and support its presence across Canada and abroad. The Council’s investments foster greater engagement in the arts among Canadians and international audiences.
The Council’s Public Lending Right (PLR) program makes annual payments to creators whose works are held in Canadian public libraries.
About Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity
Founded in 1933, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity is a learning organization built upon an extraordinary legacy of excellence in artistic and creative development. What started as a single course in drama has grown to become the global organization leading in arts, culture, and creativity across dozens of disciplines. From our home on Treaty 7 territory in the stunning Canadian Rocky Mountains, Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity aims to inspire everyone who attends our campus – artists, leaders, and thinkers – to unleash their creative potential and realize their unique contribution to society through cross-disciplinary learning opportunities, world-class performances, and public outreach.
