James H. Nash Poetry Contest

SUBMISSIONS CLOSED

First Prize: $500
2 finalists

First place winner will receive a newsletter feature. First place and finalists will all receive a website feature.

_{Photo credit: Levi Strand}

Gabrielle Calvocoressi

Gabrielle Calvocoressi is the author of The Last Time I Saw Amelia Earhart, Apocalyptic Swing (a finalist for the LA Times Book Prize), and Rocket Fantastic, winner of the Audre Lorde Award for Lesbian Poetry. Calvocoressi is the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including a Stegner Fellowship and Jones Lectureship from Stanford University; a Rona Jaffe Woman Writer’s Award; a Lannan Foundation residency in Marfa, TX; the Bernard F. Conners Prize from The Paris Review; and a residency from the Civitella di Ranieri Foundation, among others. Calvocoressi’s poems have been published or are forthcoming in numerous magazines and journals including The Baffler, The New York Times, POETRY, Boston Review, Kenyon Review, Tin House, and The New Yorker. Calvocoressi is an Editor at Large at Los Angeles Review of Books, and Poetry Editor at Southern Cultures. Works in progress include a non-fiction book entitled, The Year I Didn’t Kill Myself and a novel, The Alderman of the Graveyard. Calvocoressi teaches at UNC Chapel Hill and lives in Old East Durham, NC, where joy, compassion, and social justice are at the center of their personal and poetic practice. 

GUIDELINES:

• Open to all current SLPC members, and to current residents or students in the St. Louis metro area living within a 100-mile radius of St. Louis City
• Saint Louis Poetry Center board members are not eligible to enter the contest
• Submit up to 2 typed poems per entry, any form and length
• No manuscripts will be returned
• Simultaneous submissions are allowed, but previously published or award-winning poems are not eligible (including those that have appeared on social media, websites, blogs, etc)
• Additional poems will be accepted with additional entry fees
• Entry fee is $10, make checks payable to Saint Louis Poetry Center (NOTE: entry fee waived for current SLPC members, free entry with new/renewed membership)
• Enclose a cover sheet that includes: name, address, phone number, email address and the titles of the poems submitted
• Name and address on cover sheet only, no identifying information on poems
• Contest results will be announced in late April (NOTE: to be notified by mail, include self-addressed stamped envelope with mailed entry)

First place and finalists are invited to read their poems at Saint Louis Poetry Center’s annual Poetry Concert.

HOW TO SUBMIT:

Email* entries to:
[email protected]

*If submitting entries by email, attach cover sheet & poems as separate Word or PDF documents. Include a copy of your entry fee receipt or new/renewed membership receipt with your poems (if applicable).

Mail entries with entry fee and SASE to:
Saint Louis Poetry Center
Nash Poetry Contest
3301 Washington Ave. # 2D
St. Louis, MO 63103

ONLINE, EMAIL & POSTMARK DEADLINE:  March 31, 2022

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Congratulations to our 2021 Winners!

Congratulations to our 2020 Winners!

Congratulations to our 2019 Winners!