Welcome to Archipel
Welcome to Archipel — an ongoing dialogue between me, Cara Waterfall, and poets and creatives of all kinds. This space celebrates the ways we connect through mentorship, community and transition. If you’re interested in participating, simply reply to this newsletter or click here.
Archipel is also rooted in my first poetry mentor: my father. When you subscribe, you directly sustain the Donald E. Waterfall Scholarship Fund, supporting poets like our inaugural DEW Scholar, Isaiah Adepoju. Join us in building Year Two!
About 🌊 Currents: Voices in Motion
Beginning this month, the Abidjan Poetry Hub — first founded on Facebook — evolves into 🌊 Currents: Voices in Motion, a recurring column within Archipel. The name is new, but the spirit remains the same: community, practice and craft carried across the many languages we write, speak and dream in.
Thank you for reading, for sharing — and for being a part of this growing community.
Meet our First DEW Scholar: Isaiah Adepoju
I’m thrilled to name Isaiah Adepoju as our 2025–26 DEW Scholar—selected for his poems of vivid imagery, sonic texture and rigourous intertextual craft. Isaiah is a poet from Osun, Nigeria, whose work braids family, place and language into lines that feel generous and restrained. Recently, he won the Lagos–London Poetry Prize, was the recipient of the UNDERTOW Poetry Fellowship (UK) and provided editorial leadership at The Nigeria Review (Issues 2–4). His publications include A Long House, Brittle Paper, the Poetry Translation Centre, and more.
Isaiah shared with me what it means to be the inaugural recipient of the Donald E. Waterfall Scholarship Fund:
“The least I expect is to win anything for poetry— I am still shocked—especially at this time. Winning this scholarship fund came at a time when, already at the base of my confidence as a poet, I decided to dedicate the next two years of my life to studying and writing poems.
Poetry is often a difficult thing for me to grasp, and my inability to dedicate quality time to it, while still being called a poet, embarrasses me. So, the money and the mentorship provided as prizes of the scholarship are an immense blessing to me. They will allow me to focus squarely on this poetry for the next one year. And I am so excited for this, and deeply appreciate everybody who has made this possible. Thank you.”
A Closer Look at Isaiah’s Poems
What struck our distinguished judging panel of rob mclennan and Salima Tourkmani-MacDonald first was the music: Not ornament for its own sake, but cadence as a path to understanding. From the Judges:
Adepoju’s poems are fluid and rhythmic, characterized by intentional line breaks and vivid imagery. While brief, each of these poems is detailed and revolves around a strong emotional core. Osogbo and Mercy build upon foundations laid by poets Wallace Stevens and Michael Imossan, which demonstrates Adepoju’s engagement with poetry as a genre, as well as a deep commitment to forging intertextual connections.
In Osogbo (after Wallace Stevens) , the city is body and god at once — holy, disposable. The speaker pivots from spectacle to steadiness, hunting a rhythm that can outlast its disorder.” It inherits Stevens’s meditative stride, then reroutes it through a distinctly Nigerian cityscape — interchanges, dust, riverweed —so perception feels newly possible.
The line — “A dew so clean we see the dew inside” — opens a double aperture: we see the thing and its inner echo at once. Paratactic “And”ss drum the poem forward while mechanics turn metaphysical (“roads lift / off their shocks”). The close—fish “strategically suffering” beneath waterweeds on the Osun—grounds the thought in ecology and stakes. Homage becomes conversation, not pastiche: a lucid, urgent poem that makes the world both sharper and more mysterious.
“There, at Freedom Park, suppose January bronzes
dust. And November, sturdy, falls off the clutch
of branches. And we go on to the interchange,
away from the sound of city. On,
slinking away. Then, when roads lift
off their shocks, we love to hear the crash of cars.
And the clasp of bustiers, the slap of baguettes.
In the city we struggle lightheartedly, sometimes.
And lightbulbs go off around small slight bridges.
Parks, houses, meadows, swamps of kale. Sometimes,
A dew so clean we see the dew inside. In return
We get the clear sense of things. Afterall, even
The plain sometimes breaks for consistency. And
My stalwart hands droop in the safety of evening.
And the road speeds to ambush. And the moss peels,
And waterweeds gather above the Osun, cover the gold
rubble under. And how the fish must go strategically suffering,
flapping their fins against the riverdepth.”
In “Mercy” echoing Archipel Alumnus Michael Imossan, the declarative first line—“Shut sternum is forgiven need.”— doesn’t need to explain itself; it sets a pressure system. The poem splices clinic and chapel, garment and body, so mercy is not sentiment: light on a wall, a seam at the throat, a father’s choosing hand. Clinical and intimate at once, it stages light, fabric and the body’s angles until a final turn toward the father introduces a felt spirituality. Across these pieces, intertext isn’t a flex — it’s about lineage:
“Clinical, where wind pares the panes
like a knuckle’s dull end. A handful of flame
pointing certain way the square of flesh
on a carpet outside a lessened shadow.
Stretched, the metacarpal heat at the heart of
hands that take shape in the conflict. Its
weight inverts, lies carpet-low. Colour
in an empty wardrobe, and slats of light
on the wall curlicues that signal
The ending to a hostility.
Crickets, dunk in windownets at the hour
of original death. Clothes many, indistinguishable
in a diameter on the carpet—
chosen for dolorous flexibility.
Sleeves for hands.
Seams for angles. Neckline rope-tight and
determined, which my father chose for me
at prepubescence from the ramshackle heirloom…”
Finalists Shout-out:
I want to thank Pamilerin Jacob and Elena Senechal Becker for the brilliance and heart in their submissions.
Why the D.E.W. Scholarship Fund Matters
I founded The Donald E. Waterfall Scholarship Fund to honour the kind of attention my father taught me: how to really read a poem, how to listen across languages — how to treat literature as a living commons. When I read Isaiah’s poems, I felt that familiar pull of attention; the poems didn’t posture; they invited me in.
My father, Donald E. Waterfall, believed reading could happen anywhere — with grandkids tugging at his sleeve, in waiting rooms, on the sidelines of a baseball game. We read Robert Louis Stevenson’s A Child’s Garden of Verse together; by middle school he had introduced me to William Blake and William Wordsworth, and nudged me (wonderfully early! toward James Joyce.
He was the first in his family to finish high school (University of Toronto ’65) and garnered a full scholarship to Princeton for his PhD in Philosophy. He was also a diplomat who retired early to teach. And a grandfather who immediately set aside education funds for his grandchildren when they were born.
After his sudden passing in April 2021, I kept asking myself: how do I pass this ritual of attention forward? The Donald E. Waterfall (DEW) Scholarship Fund is one way.
It matters, because poets matter — especially for those whose talent is abundant, but for whom time and resources are scarce.
A scholarship cannot fix structural inequities; however, it can buy back hours for writing, reimburse travel to a poetry reading, cover submissions, stabilize one semester — and give an emerging poet a community and a compass.
Gratitude
This scholarship is powered by readers, friends and poets, who believe in equitable literary ecosystems. Thank you to this small, but mighty chorus of founding subscribers and donors whose gifts — from modest monthly commitments to generous one‑time contributions — seeded the first cycle. I am in your debt.
R. & P. Malcolmson • E. Waterfall • Mike Shaver • O. & K. Moorhouse • Nadine Araksi • Stephen T Berg • M. Joslin • J. O’Grady • C. Andrigo • J. Morrison • Elena Barcia • Lee Ann Pickrell • T. Waterfall • J. S. Stockwell • J. & M. Coleman
From Reading to Reward
I read every submission and moved three to the final round. I was delighted by the stellar applications we received.
And because transparency is part of the Fund’s DNA, here’s the 2024-2025 breakdown: Out of the $2200 USD raised, 88.4% of contributions will go straight to the recipient abnd 11.6% covered the judges’ honoraria. (Any administrative costs were covered separately by me.)
What’s next for Isaiah
Over the next twelve months, Isaiah will participate in monthly mentorship sessions with me. The first session will lay the foundation for what we hope to achieve in the coming year (October 1, 2025 - October 1, 2026).
I’ll be sharing quarterly updates on Isaiah. I’m really looking forward to working with him — and of course, learning from him!
A Glimpse Ahead
If Isaiah’s win moved you, help me seed the next poet’s year for the 2026-2027 cycle. Even a small gift keeps the door open — books bought, data paid, a workshop held.
If you’d rather donate to fulfill a specific need, just email me and I’ll share options:
And even if you can’t give today, sharing this post helps more than you know.
To everyone who reads Archipel: you’re a part of this bridge, too. Your engagement made Isaiah’s year possible. I can’t thank you enough!
With love and intention,
Cara
Congratulations to isiah. This is beautiful. In the world where less people talk about art and those who hold the true secret and power of words, you still make yourself different to keep promoting art and encouraging other aspiring artists… I remember what Austin kleon said in his book, Show Your Work! He said— if people ask about your work as an artist, the next question will probably be: are you making money out of it? That enough can discourage creative minds who are yet to thrive in the creative world. A big thanks to the organizers and sponsors. Looking forward to the growth of other artists in the world.
Congrats, Isaiah!