On Friday the Australian Poetry Centre hosted Dreaming in AUSLAN an event that brought together hearing and non-hearing poets from across the country.
The evening saw the awarding of a national poetry prize for poems that appeal to all the senses with a unique perspective. Winner Canberra-based poet Melinda Smith was excited that her poem cast light on an often ignored issue. “My poem ‘autistic child with acute auditory processing disorder’ brings this disorder to a wider audience because it explains the experience of people who don’t often have a voice and rarely appear in poetry,” Smith told the Wheeler Centre.
The poem was one of five performed on the night by Melbourne poets. “I was totally over the moon that Andy Jackson performed it because I love his work and saw him perform at Goolwa Salt on the Tongue Poetry Festival.”
The winners will be published on the APC website and broadcast on Nothing Rhymes with RRR.