We are thrilled to announce that the winner of the 7th edition of The International Metatron Poetry Prize is The Goat’s Tongue by Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye.

Selected by this year’s guest judge, poet and artist Precious Okoyomon, the manuscript was chosen for its visionary power, experimental vitality, and emotional intensity. Okoyomon writes:

“this book is beyond brilliant is the constant time out of time it embraces creating a weirdly free cannibalization of language , so feral and hungry  I was compelled and captivated, wielding memory and love, unmaking and making the self, a vortex of magical joy.”

The Goat’s Tongue is a ceremony of silence, soil, and becoming — a collection that follows the story of a girl, a goat, and an owl as they traverse landscapes of vulnerability, belonging, and memory through symbolic dialogue. Written in both English and a symbolic language developed during a 138-hour performance ritual titled Ori. Ara. Emi. (Ori. Ori. My Head), the manuscript explores themes of pica, postcolonial silence, Yoruba mythology, ancestral memory, and forgiveness.

“To be human means stability,
open-ness, vulnerability.
to be human means I am who you are,
forgiveness, apologizes.”
— from The Goat’s Tongue

Peace Akintade-Oluwagbeye is an African-Canadian interdisciplinary poet, playwright, performer, and public speaker. Born in Yorubaland, Nigeria and based in Saskatoon, she currently serves as Saskatchewan’s 11th Poet Laureate. Her work bridges Yoruba oral tradition with contemporary performance and poetic experimentation. She is the author of Earth Skin, and her plays have been staged with Obsidian Theatre, CBC Gem, Persephone Theatre, and the National Arts Centre. She is the recipient of the RBC SaskArts Emerging Artist Award and the Platinum Jubilee Queen’s Medal, among other honours.

The original performance work that generated The Goat’s Tongue, Ori. Ara. Emi., was supported by Bridges Art Movement (BAM) and SK Arts. We thank them for making space and resources available for this extraordinary ritual-performance to unfold.

The Goat’s Tongue will be published by Metatron Press in Fall 2026.

We extend our deepest congratulations to Peace and our sincerest thanks to all who submitted. We are honoured to continue supporting transformative poetic voices through the Metatron Prize. Previous Prize winners include: The Choice Is Real, Little Fury, ʔbédayine, number one earth, Soft Focus, and Pony Castle. Peace is the third Canadian to win our international prize.