CMU Creative Writing student wins prominent national award

Central Michigan University Creative Writing graduate student Edwin Williamson’s list of successes continues to grow. Williamson is the 2022 winner of the Dan Veach Prize for Younger Poets for his poem “Each Day I Press My Ear to the Ground.”

The Dan Veach Prize is a national contest for college students named for the founding editor of Atlanta Review, a journal of national and international prominence that has, as its website says, published “...Poet Laureates and Nobel Laureates, often before they were famous.”

Williamson says reading the judge’s kind words made this award extra special.

“I was in tears over the level of acknowledgement and appreciation that was being held for my work,” Williamson said. “I’ve always been proud of my writing, but to have that pride reinforced and having this prize as something to show—it means a lot.”

This is just the latest in a list of accolades. Williamson received a fellowship for the Pierce Cedar Creek Institute in the summer of 2022 and won the 2021 Aliki Perroti and Seth Frank Most Promising Young Poet Award for his poem “Life As We Know It,” an award sponsored by the Academy of American Poets. 

Williamson will graduate from CMU this spring with a Master’s Degree in Creative Writing. He completed his undergraduate degree from CMU in May of 2022 with majors in Anthropology and English, Literature, Language and Writing.

What’s next? Williamson is currently submitting applications to attend an MFA program in poetry next year. Keep your eyes on the skies for this rising poetry star.