Selina Boan’s the Undoing Hours earns Pat Lowther Memorial Award at the 2022 League of Canadian Poets Book Awards
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“To be shortlisted with so many exceptional poets was truly such a dream,” Boan said in an email. “To be named the winner of the Pat Lowther Memorial Award on top of that, I can’t quite believe it.
“I wrote this book in celebration of nêhiyawêwin (cree language), thinking about the messiness, challenges, and immense joy that has come along with learning and (re)connection. Hiy hiy (thank you) to the League for making space for these awards in celebration of poetry,” the white settler–nehiyaw poet added.
According to a statement, Undoing Hours “tells stories of meeting family, of experiencing love and heartbreak, and of learning new ways to express and understand the world through nêhiyawêwin.”
In a statement, the selection jury pointed to Boan’s ability to sift and shift through time and language as an “admirable feat of working between our unique national dilemma ‘between two dialects and that largeness of love for all things most dear such as Nohtâwiy.”
Boan’s work has been published in The Best Canadian Poetry 2018 and 2020. She has received several honors for her poetry, including Room’s 2018 Emerging Writer Award and the 2017 National Magazine Award for Poetry. She is currently a poetry editor for Rahila’s Ghost Press and is a member of the Growing Room Collective.
The Pat Lowther Memorial Award is given for a book of poetry by a Canadian woman.