Late last year we told you about Cave Canem's announcement [4] of the inaugural Cave Canem [5] Northwestern Press Poetry Prize, a second book award for African American poets. Six months later, the nonprofit has announced the first winner of the prize: Indigo Moor [6] for his book Through the Stonecutter's Window. John Keene [7], who, along with Reginald Gibbons [8] and Parneshia Jones, judged the prize, wrote that Moor's poems "open a sustained and impressive dialogue with the visual arts, history, the natural world, and the poet's dreams and nightmares, while dancing poly-rhythmically across and down each page."
Moor's first poetry collection, Tap-Root, was published in 2006 by Main Street Rag [9] as part of its Editor's Select Poetry Series. Northwestern University Press [10] will publish Through the Stonecutter's Window in March 2010.
In addition, two poets received honorable mention: Remica Bingham [11] for "What We Ask of Flesh" and JoAnne McFarland for "Acid Rain."