Finding a New Voice Through Poetry

“When I finally allowed myself to write poems through the perspectives of speakers whose worlds I inhabit only briefly, something shifted. An entirely new dimension opened in my writing. I found freedom to explore ideas with a sense of play, of distance, and of empathy I had not accessed before. In that space I could step away from the impulse to ‘be me’ and instead inhabit, observe, and imagine.”

 

For the poem she submitted to the competition, Ms. Manuel inhabited someone recording voice messages to be used on a company helpline.

 

"The poem started after I read about voice actors whose recordings were being used to train AI,” she told the CBC. “What happens to all those human traces we leave behind – the pauses, the hesitations, that breath you hear between sentences? It turned into this reflection on voice as both labour and inheritance. There's something unsettling, almost intimate, about hearing yourself transformed into something tireless and bodiless, just endlessly available. But when I dig down to what it's truly about, beneath all the technology, it's a grief poem. It's about the pieces of ourselves we give away just to be heard, and everything that disappears in the process.

 

"I wanted to test whether a poem about contemporary technology – specifically AI and voice actors – could find a wide audience. The CBC felt like the right venue: a place where poetry about current issues can still maintain its literary quality. I was curious if a poem about something as specific as voice actors training AI could connect with readers who might have considered these questions before – whether the technical could also be poetic."

The original 3,000-plus submissions were screened by a reading committee of editors and writers from across the country and narrowed down to approximately 100 that went to a second committee. The second committee cut that number down to a long list that went to the jury composed of respected poets Carol Rose GoldenEagle, Paul Vermeersch and Britta B, who decided on the shortlist and winner.

 

Ms. Manuel said it was “both exhilarating and humbling” to be a finalist. “Exhilarating because it is a moment of external recognition of a craft I have worked toward quietly and steadily over time. Humbling because I know how many writers submit, how many poems remain unseen, and how many voices go unheard. To be among the finalists is an honour and also a renewal, a reminder that the risk of turning toward vulnerability, of writing what we do not yet know, is worth it. But, truly, I would not have done it were it not for my students and how much they inspire me.”

 

The CBC Literary Prizes – which include the Poetry Prize – have been recognizing Canadian writers since 1979. Past winners include Susan Musgrave, Lorna Crozier, Alison Pick, Michael Ondaatje and Carol Shields.

 

Ms. Manuel is the author of the debut novel The Heaviness of Things That Float, which won the Ethel Wilson Prize for Fiction, and the literary novel The Morning Bell Brings the Broken Hearted. She has also published two children’s novels, Head to Head – a Red Cedar Award finalist – and Dressed to Play, as well as the YA novel Open Secrets.