A new poetry award, inspired by poet Carol DeCanio Abeles, will recognize three Santa Barbara Country poets with cash awards. The prize is intended to encourage adult poets who have not yet published a full-length book of poems. Each prize is awarded for a single poem, and poets can send up to three poems per entry.

Submissions are due by March 15. To learn more, visit the Gunpowder Press website.

“Our poetry community is incredibly vibrant, but it can be difficult for adult poets to share their work,” said Chryss Yost, who served as poet laureate in Santa Barbara from 2013-15. “This prize is meant to be a way to encourage poets at the beginning of their poetry career, whether they are 20, 40, 60 or more. Poetry is open to everyone.”

The awards will be 1st place, $500; runner-up, $300; and second runner-up, $200. Winners will be announced online and on social media by Santa Barbara’s independent poetry publisher Gunpowder Press, as well as being displayed by the Santa Barbara Library. 

The prize honors DeCanio Abeles, who was an enthusiastic supporter of poets in the community. She organized poetry month displays every April and encouraged other poets to share their work.

DeCanio Abeles held art shows of her photography paired with her poetry at the Sojourner Café, UCSB Faculty Club, and First Thursday venues. She was the poetry columnist at VOICE Casa Magazine for six years, and organized poetry workshops, and the Santa Barbara Poetry Series.

She created displays at the Santa Barbara Public Library to celebrate National Poetry Month. In 2005 DeCanio Abeles and then-Mayor Marty Blum set up the position of Santa Barbara Poet Laureate.

To celebrate National Poetry Month, 2007-19, DeCanio Abeles solicited and chose poems by elementary school students to be displayed at Chaucer’s Bookstore. She was the children’s librarian at Congregation B’nai B’rith for 16 years.