Beverly Hopkins Poetry Contest for High School Students
SUBMISSIONS NOW OPEN
First Prize: $225
Second Prize: $125
Third Prize: $75
Winning poems will be published on Saint Louis Poetry Center’s website.
2023 Contest Judge:
Allison Joseph
Allison Jospeh
Allison Joseph currently lives, teaches, and writes in Carbondale, Illinois, where she is part of the creative writing faculty at Southern Illinois University. Her most recent collections of poems are Speak and Spell (Glass Lyre Press, 2022), Any Proper Weave (Kelsay Books, 2022), Lexicon (Red Hen Press, 2021), Professional Happiness (Backbone Press, 2021), and Confessions of a Barefaced Woman (Red Hen Press, 2018). Confessions of a Barefaced Woman won the 2019 Feathered Quill Book Award and was a finalist in the poetry category for the 2019 NAACP Image Award. Lexicon received the Poetry by the Sea Book Award from the Poetry by the Sea Conference.
Her poems have appeared in the New York Times and in the Best American Poetry Series. She is the widow of poet and editor Jon Tribble.
Submissions Open:
December 1 – March 15
Entry Fee:
None
GUIDELINES:
- Open to all high school students in the St. Louis metro area living within a 100-mile radius of St. Louis
- Submit up to 3 typed poems per entry, any form and length
- No manuscripts will be returned
- Poems previously published in high school publications are allowed
- Include name (no pen name required) and email address on each poem
- Enclose a cover sheet that includes: name, address, phone number, email address, high school, grade, teacher’s name (if she/he/they encouraged or assigned the poems), and the titles of the poems submitted
- Contest results will be announced in May
Prize winners and honorable mentions are invited to read their poems at Saint Louis Poetry Center’s annual Poetry Concert.
HOW TO SUBMIT:
Or mail entries to:
Saint Louis Poetry Center
Hopkins High School Poetry Contest
3301 Washington Ave. # 2D
Saint Louis, MO 63103
ONLINE & POSTMARK DEADLINE EXTENDED: March 15, 2023
Questions:
If you have questions or any issues submitting your contest entry online, please email:
[email protected]
Congratulations to our 2022 Winners!
FIRST PLACE
Tenley Hall, Clayton High School
Up North
SECOND PLACE
Jelani Penny-Johnson, Metro Academic & Classical High School
This is the Life We Have
THIRD PLACE
Margaret Handley, Nerinx Hall High School
Threadwork
HONORABLE MENTIONS
Delaney Carey, Nerinx Hall High School
To Pin A Bouncy-Ball Down
Charlie Wagner, St. Louis Priory School
What the Bartender Said
Nicholas Merlo, Crossroads College Preparatory School
Kick Me While I’m Down
Tatum Ladner, Clayton High School
Brown Buttons
Congratulations to our 2021 Winners!
FIRST PLACE
Oviya Srihari, Ladue Horton Watkins High School
Partition as Narrated by an American Daughter
SECOND PLACE
Grace Ruo, Hazelwood West High School
African in America
THIRD PLACE
Cedric Bruges, St. Louis Priory School
Building Sandcastles
HONORABLE MENTIONS
Lara Wulff, Central Visual & Performing Arts High School
Cicada Funeral
Rachel Voss, Fort Zumwalt South High School
Moonshine Boy
Oviya Srihari, Ladue Horton Watkins High School
Advice from Your Daily Horoscope
Congratulations to our 2020 Winners!
FIRST PLACE
Rowan Elliott, Gateway Science Academy
Adagio
SECOND PLACE
Adam Figueras, St. Louis Priory School
If a Girl Kept All Her Kings in the Back Row
THIRD PLACE
Amina Aser, Parkway West High School
My Lost Art Project
Congratulations to our 2019 Winners!
FIRST PLACE
Megan McGhee, Kirkwood High School
Oldest Moon
SECOND PLACE
Ann Zhang, John Burroughs School
Doomsday: The Asian Superstore
THIRD PLACE
Rachel Lyu, St. Louis University High School
Untitled (The World After Wine)
HONORABLE MENTIONS
Christina Giudici, Nerinx Hall High School
Rocket Science
Sarah Corrigan, Visitation Academy
Through the Cracks
Madeline Burns, Parkway West High School
February, in a White Nissan Versa