Date:   7/9/01 11:11:44 AM Eastern Daylight Time
From:   [log in to unmask] (cristobal martin)

Dear Sir/Madam:

Please be advised of the following literary event:

RULES FOR THE TWENTY-FIRST ANNUAL AWARD OF THE
FERNANDO RIELO WORLD PRIZE FOR MYSTICAL POETRY

The FERNANDO RIELO FOUNDATION is sponsoring and announcing the Twenty-First 
World Prize for Mystical Poetry, which shall be governed by the following 
Rules.

1.  Previously unpublished works of poetry originally written in either 
Spanish or English or translated into one of these two languages shall be 
eligible for the Fernando Rielo World Prize for Mystical Poetry.

2.  Each entry must be presented by its author.  The minimum length for 
entries shall be 600 lines, and the maximum length, 1300 lines.  The text of 
the entry may be a single poem or a collection of poems.  A given work of 
poetry may be presented only once for this yearly award.

3.  The Prize shall be awarded for mystical poetry expressing the profound 
religious significance of man's spiritual values.

4.  The Prize shall consist of 6,000 euros ($7,000) and the publication of 
the entry selected.

5.  The Prize is indivisible and shall be awarded for single entry.  It may 
not be awarded in the absence of suitable candidate.

6.  A single printed or typed copy of each entry, securely bond, shall be 
presented.  If possible, entries should also be sent in an electronic version 
on a diskette or as an email attachment.  The cover or first page shall bear 
the title of the work and the author's name, street address, telephone 
number, and email address, where applicable.  The use of sealed entries and 
pseudonyms is thus prohibited.

7.  The deadline for submitting entries shall be October 15, 2001, and all 
entries postmarked on or before that date shall be accepted.  Entries should 
be sent to the following address:

FUNDACIÓN FERNANDO RIELO
Jorge Juan, 102 – 2º B
28009 MADRID - Spain
    (34) 915  75 40 91

The identification “Mystical Poetry Prize (21st Annual Award)” should be 
added in the lower left-hand corner of the envelope.  The e-mail address for 
the Prize is [log in to unmask], and the Foundation's website is www.rielo.com.

8.  The founder of the Prize, Fernando Rielo, shall constitute and chair the 
Jury.

9.  The Jury's decision shall be made before December 15, 2001, and both the 
winner and the media shall immediately be informed thereof.
 
10. There shall be no correspondence with the authors of entries, and the 
entries themselves shall not be returned, but shall be destroyed ten days 
after the Jury's decision.

11.     The decision of the Jury is final.                                    
                                                                              
  

12.     The sending of entries for consideration signifies full acceptance of 
these Rules for the Prize.



BRIEF HISTORY OF THE FERNANDO RIELO WORLD PRIZE OF MYSTICAL POETRY
The World Prize was created by Fernando Rielo in 1981 with the aim of 
promoting mystical poetry and finding and making known those poets that unite 
an elevated spirituality to an authentic literary expression. When this 
double-premise is not fulfilled, the Prize is awarded, rather than declaring 
it void, to true poets who, though they cannot be considered mystics in a 
strict sense, contribute a work worthy of note.
The works submitted to the World Prize of Mystical Poetry must be written in 
Spanish or English or translated to one of these two languages. The entries 
must be unpublished and have an extension which is not to be less than 600 
verses nor longer than 1,300. The Prize is awarded annually, and is endowed 
with 1,000,000 ptas., and the publication of the winning work.
The worldwide renown enjoyed by this Prize has made it possible for the 
awards ceremony to be celebrated in prestigious international settings such 
as the United Nations in New York, the Senate of France and UNESCO in Paris, 
the Municipality of Rome, The Gothic Hall of Cologne, the Museum of El Prado, 
the Municipality of Madrid, The Council Chambers of the Province of Bologna, 
and the Embassy of Spain before the Holy See.
Former editions of the Prize have been, among others, awarded to: Blanca 
Andreu, Manuel Álvarez Ortega, José García Nieto, Montserrat Maristany, Luis 
López Anglada, and Miguel de Santiago (Spain); Marin Sorescu (Romania); Alain 
Bosquet (France); Charles Carrère (Senegal); Daniel Ben Rafael Stawski 
(Israel); Takis Varvitsiotis (Greece); Laureano Albán (Costa Rica); Mateja 
Matevski (Macedonia); and Liubomir Levtchev (Bulgaria).

FERNANDO RIELO’S CONCEPTION OF MYSTICAL POETRY

I understand mystical poetry under two aspects.

a)  The specific or full sense consists of conveying with sufficient poetic 
skill the different modes of the soul's intimate personal experience of union 
with God in love and pain-in the case of the Christian poet, in relation to 
the Most Holy Trinity; in that of the non-Christian poet, in relation to God 
alone.  The fullest exclusive consecration to Supreme Love, insofar as 
possible in this life, is what distinguishes mystical poetry from other 
poetic genres.  If religious poetry and, along with it, the remaining poetic 
genres are not formed by this union of love with the Absolute, they are 
reduced to a religere which is deformed, rather than merely formless.  This 
deformation is the departure point for what I term "antimystical poetry" and 
“antireligious poetry.” It is quite certain that this deformity cannot 
totally annihilate the transcendence which defines the poet: all poetry is 
openness to the mystery of suffering that is man.

b)  The general or incipient sense consists of conveying with supreme mastery 
the intimate experience of love with the Absolute in the various modes of 
searching presented by the human being's spiritual cor inquietum.  In this 
regard, I consider mysticism to be open-that is, incipient in all human 
beings because of the ontological fact that, rather than rational, political, 
or symbolic animals, they are "mystical beings." On account of their mystical 
or ontological status, human beings, from the first instant of their 
conception, are betrothed to God-that is, united, constituted, and related.  
Mystical life, in keeping with this definition of man, is the incrementing, 
by way of grace, of the immanent constitutive presence of the Divine Persons 
in the human person: this is what the elevation of mystical life to its 
greatest possible intimacy consists of.

The aim of mystical poetry is to confess one's faith.  The human word, as the 
image and likeness of the divine word, with a mystical brushstroke must trace 
out a language of hidden perfumed essences summoning up man's heavenly 
destiny unevasively.

Mystical poetry is not at all reductive; eminently creative, it is capable of 
engendering new stylistic recourses, new forms, and, in general terms, 
inexhaustible wealth for conveying the soul's mystical union with the Creator 
by means of the aesthetic image.  Mystical poetry is also a universal, 
transcendental vision of a humanity journeying towards its celestial goal.  
Nature and the cosmos are added to this mystical march, offering themselves 
to human beings for the purpose of illuminating the noblest sense of their 
unitive experience of love.

Mystical poetry differs from religious poetry in that, unlike the latter, it 
possesses a vast horizon through which it passionately recreates the 
multiform values of human spirituality.  So-called "religious poetry"-often 
mixed up with "antimystical or antireligious poetry," which is ranting, 
brazen, condemnatory, and even blasphemous-generally exhibits the traits of 
searching and feeling on a cultural level, rather than creative inner 
experience.  What poet has not posed the subject of religion, even if only 
tangentially?  The property defining mystical poetry is not to deal with God 
as a theme, as an "existential" description, as a stylistic recourse, or as a 
kind of experimental choice, but rather to raise loving union with the 
Absolute to art to such a degree that the constant of that poetry must evoke 
this mystical union in a most lofty manner.

The experience of the union of love with God is so intimate, so vital, and so 
definitive that the mystical poet, as opposed to the so-called religious 
poet, will never wonder about the existence or non-existence of God, not even 
as an aesthetic recourse, just as the existence or non-existence of the air 
one breathes is never questioned.

Fernando Rielo

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