Join us for a reading by the winners and honorable mentions of the eighth annual Muriel’s Journey Poetry Prize. This unique poetry prize celebrates the legacy of Indigenous Downtown Eastside poet-activist Muriel Marjorie by requiring community involvement by entrants as its only submission fee.
Location: Online
Type: Poetry, Reading
Sponsored by: Word Vancouver · Muriel’s Journey Poetry Prize
Host: Isabella Mori
Readers:
Downtown Eastside 1st prize
The Cost of Home
Ishkode Manidoowag
1st prize
Just for Today
Jane Harris
2nd prize
The Orchard
Kamila Rina
Fortuna’s Choice
This Conversation Never Happened
Natalie Lanoville
Honorable mentions
Fraser River 1973
Marie Cocking
The wings to be cut
Diem Okoye
First Born
Antoinette Cheung
On Holding the Line
Ishkode Manidoowag
About The Host
Isabella Mori
Isabella Mori is the founder of Muriel’s Journey Poetry Prize and lives on the unceded, traditional and ancestral lands of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh people aka Vancouver, Canada. They are the author of three books of and about poetry, including Not So Pretty Haiku, and a book about mental health and addiction, Believe Me. Poetry, short stories, and essays have been in places such as Cutting Letters Anthology, Presence, Signs Of Life, The Group Of Seven Reimagined, Through The Portal (a SCWES prize winner), and Personal Essayist. Isabella won second prize in poetry and 3rd prize in nonfiction at the 2024 RCLAS Write On Contest. In 2021, Isabella was a writer-in-residence at the Historic Joy Kogawa House.
The image below features one of Fire From The Heart chapbooks. Each year the prize publishes a chapbook through Three Ocean Press.
About The Readers
Jane Harris
Jane Harris is a Canadian poet, essayist, and author. She was awarded an Alberta Literary Award for short non-fiction and placed third in the Susan Crean Surrey Muse non-fiction competition. Jane is the author of two creative non-fiction books, and her essays appear in anthologies published by Tidewater Press and University of Alberta press. She lives on Treaty Seven Territory. In addition to writing, she supports her community as a loving mother and grandmother, by volunteering with local community organizations such as her church, and by speaking up on issues such as poverty and civic engagement.
Antoinette Cheung
Antoinette Cheung (張冬眉) is on a mission to rewild her imagination after spending too many years immersed in corporate speak. As an immigrant from Hong Kong whose main language has become English, she is energized by the voices of writers embracing their hyphenated identities. She writes primarily short-form poetry and personal essays. In 2025, she was part of the TD Emerging Writer Mentorship Program. Before the Muriel's Journey Poetry Prize, her poems have been awarded Top Winner in the Vancouver Cherry Blossom Festival Haiku Invitational (2023, 2025), and appeared in Ricepaper, Poetry Pause, and international haiku journals/anthologies. Antoinette was previously co-editor for the online journals Prune Juice and confluence, which celebrate the art of Japanese short-form poetry within a contemporary English-language context.
