New Measure Prize banner

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

Parlor Press's poetry series, Free Verse Editions, is pleased to announce the eleventh annual New Measure Poetry Prize, which will carry a cash award of $1,000 and publication of an original, unpublished manuscript of poems. Up to three other manuscripts may be accepted for publication by Free Verse Editions editors. Submit a manuscript of at least 54 pages with a $28 entry fee between March 1 and June 1 each year. The window for the 2024 competition will open on 1 March 2024. The judge for the 2024 competition is Jon Thompson.

Click on this Submit button to visit the New Measure Poetry Prize submission interface at Submittable on or after March 1 and no later than June 1:

The New Measure Poetry Prize Winners

2023: Lily Brown, Blade Work [selected by Carl Phillips]
2022: Molly Spencer, Invitatory [selected by Jon Thompson]
2021: Aby Kaupang, & there’s still you thrill hour of the world to love and Joy Manesiotis, A Short History of Anger [selected by Brenda Hillman]
2020: Martha Ronk, Ariadne, A Series [selected by Jon Thompson]
2019: Parallel Resting Places by Laura Wetherington [selected by Peter Gizzi]
2018: Empire by Tracy Zeman [selected by Jon Thompson]
2017: Not into the Blossoms and Not into the Air by Elizabeth Jacobson [selected by Marianne Boruch]
2016: The Miraculous Courageous by Josh Booton [selected by Jon Thompson]
2015: This History That Just Happened by Hannah Craig [selected by Yusef Komunyakaa]
2014: Spool by Matthew Cooperman [selected by Jon Thompson]
2013: No Shape Bends the River So Long by Monica Berlin and Beth Marzoni [Selected by Carolyn Forché]
2012: Dismantling the Angel by Eric Pankey [selected by Jon Thompson]
2011: The Canticle of the Night Path by Jennifer Atkinson [selected by Susan Stewart]
2010: Country Album by James Capozzi [selected by Jon Thompson]
2009:  13 Ways of Happily by Emily Carr [selected by Cole Swensen]

Other manuscripts not selected for the New Measure Poetry Prize may still be eligible for publication by Free Verse Editions. Friends and former students of the judge are not eligible for the prize but may submit for publication to Free Verse Editions (please indicate whether the submission is for the prize or for publication only). Each manuscript should be word processed, paginated, and contain a list of acknowledgments for published or forthcoming poems. The title page should include the name of the author, a postal address, telephone number, and email address. No feedback on submitted manuscripts can be offered. The recipient(s) of the New Measure Poetry Prize will be announced in December each year.

For more information about Free Verse Editions, visit the series page.

Free Verse Logo

Unsplash image

unsplash-logo Rhema Kallianpur