Kyeren Regehr has made the 2019 CBC Poetry Prize longlist for Acceptance is a kind of dying.

The winner of the 2019 CBC Poetry Prize will receive $6,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts, have their work published on CBC Books and attend a two-week writing residency at the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity. Four finalists will each receive $1,000 from the Canada Council for the Arts and have their work published on CBC Books.

The shortlist will be announced on Nov. 14, 2019. The winner will be announced on Nov. 21, 2019.

Kyeren Regehr's first collection, Cult Life, is upcoming in spring 2020. She enjoyed several years on the poetry board of The Malahat Review and has twice received grants from the Canada Council for the Arts. Her writing can be found in journals and anthologies in Canada, the United States and Australia.

Transitioning, parental love versus grief.

"This poem began as a way to understand an emotional dilemma: my grief as a parent of a transitioning adult child in juxtaposition to my deep love and desire to support the transition. In speaking with other parents and friends of transitioning people, it's clear that there's a conversation not being heard — which is understandable, because the people of the trans community are the ones bravely beating a path uphill through discrimination and intolerance, so their voices need to be at the forefront. As a parent, I struggled with self-judgment for feeling grief over the loss of my child as I'd known them for 20 years. And being a poet, I couldn't not write about it."

Inside my daughter's old wardrobe
next to the prom dress that desired
twenty-six hours of stitching, boned
brocade corset, a field of silk
roses trailing the skirt like
drag-queen regalia, next to this
her breasts in a stained
glass coffin, her soft fine hair