Research biologist based in Berlin receives $10,000 prize given to unpublished Black poets

NEW YORK (AP) — A biologist’s debut poetry collection that weaves science with a condemnation of slavery and colonialism has received a $10,000 literary award. The Cave Canem Prize helped launch the career of such prize winners as Natasha Trethewey and Tracy K. Smith. Dr. Brandon Kilbourne’s “Natural History” is this year’s winner of the Cave Canem award, given for work by an unpublished Black poet. The award was first given, in 1999, to Trethewey, a Pulitzer Prize winner and former U.S. poet laureate who was the judge for Kilbourne’s prize.