Angelica Esquivel Wins Zócalo’s 10th Annual Poetry Prize

In ‘La Mujer,’ a Silver-Haired Believer Bridges a Generational and Cultural Gap

Each year for the past decade, the Zócalo Poetry Prize has been awarded to the U.S. poem that best evokes a connection to place.

The power of this concept to unite our distinct realities around universal themes feels especially important in this year of separation. Place can illuminate the commonalities that flow between a 9-year-old poet muddling through distance learning and a retiree turning to the form for the first time in the pandemic. The 2021 prize submissions—more than 900 poems from more than 450 poets—also included poems that were written …