September 4, 2026
The Council of the Royal Society of NSW was delighted to learn that Emeritus Professor Kit Kelen FRSN has been awarded the prestigious inaugural Southerly Poetry Prize for 2026 for his poem “Now, Here, This.”
First published in Southerly almost fifty years ago, Kit Kelen is a well-known name in Australian poetry, as an editor, translator, academic and poet.
In 2024, he won the biggest Australian prize for a poem – the Newcastle Poetry Prize.
The judges, Paul Dawson, Bronwyn Lea, and Kate Fagan, read 661 anonymised entries before selecting a shortlist and winner for the Southerly Prize. Here is what they said:
“Now • Here • This” stands out for its linguistic verve, its lyric expression of a soul on the cusp of, in contemplation of, death. A celebration of mortality, the poem’s clipped utterances, imperatives, reflections, and interrogations populate caesura-packed couplets that are typically end-stopped yet spill across stanzas in an effortless rhythm. The poem displays the virtue of the art form where meaning is abundant yet elusive, like the speaker, both an embodied self and an anonymous lyric voice.
His latest books of poetry are:
In Early Light – Aubades (Walleah Press), and
FOOD OF LOVE – Concert Pieces (Flying Islands Books)
