-1000 Below: Flash Prose and Poetry Contest
Enter Midway Journal’s -1000 Below: Flash Prose and Poetry Contest for a chance to win the $500 grand prize! See contest guidelines below.
Opens: March 1st
Closes: June 1st
Fee: $10 per entry (unlimited entries)
Prizes:
First Prize: $500 + publication in Midway Journal
Second Prize:$250 + publication in Midway Journal
Third Prize: $50 + publication in Midway Journal
Judge: Lee Horikoshi Roripaugh
Contest Guidelines:
Entries and payments must be received through Midway Journal‘s online submission manager under “-1000 Below: Flash Prose and Poetry Contest.” You may submit an unlimited number of entries, but a new entry fee must be paid for each new submission. You may also submit to each genre. However, there is only one grand prize winner, one second prize winner and one third prize winner and not a winner in each genre.
Paste the title of your submission and your contact information (name, mailing address, telephone number, and email address) in the cover letter box. Your name and contact information must not appear anywhere on the manuscript you upload.
Previously published work will not be accepted. Simultaneous submissions are permitted, but must be withdrawn from the contest if accepted elsewhere.
Poetry: up to 2 poems per entry, up to 55 words per poem. No more than one poem per page.
Prose (Fiction and Nonfiction): 1 piece per entry, up to 1,000 words per piece.
All submissions will be considered for publication.
Judge: Lee Horikoshi Roripaugh
Lee Horikoshi Roripaugh (she/they) is a biracial Nisei and the author of five volumes of poetry, most recently tsunami vs. the fukushima 50 (Milkweed Editions, 2019), named a “Best Book of 2019” by the New York Public Library and listed as a poetry finalist in the 2020 Lambda Literary Awards. Her fiction collection, Reveal Codes, winner of the Moon City Press Short Fiction Award, was published by Moon City Press in 2023, and their chapbook, #stringofbeads, a winner of the Diode Chapbook Competition, was published by Diode Press in 2023. Her book of lyric essays, unMothered, unTongued, was recently named winner of the Sue William Silverman Prize for Creative Nonfiction in the 2024 AWP Award Series and will be forthcoming from the University of Georgia Press. Horikoshi Roripaugh received the Association of Asian American Studies Book Award in Poetry/Prose for 2004, and was a 1998 winner of the National Poetry Series. Seven of their essays have been listed as Notable Essays in Best American Essays, and her poetry, fiction, and essays have appeared in Kenyon Review, Virginia Quarterly Review, American Poetry Review, Story Magazine, Terrain.org, Hotel Amerika, and North American Review, among others.
Judging Process:
The staff of Midway Journal will select a group of finalists from all the contest entries. Finalists will be chosen for strong work regardless of genre and sent to the judge by September. The finalists will be sent to judge blindly. A winner will be announced in October.
Enter Midway Journal’s Action/Words Poetry Contest for a chance to win the $300 grand prize! See contest guidelines below.
Opens: October 1st
Closes: December 31st
Fee: $10 per entry (unlimited entries)
Prizes:
First Prize: $300 + publication in Midway Journal
Second Prize: $150 + publication in Midway Journal
Third Prize: $50 + publication in Midway Journal
Judge: Ana Božičević
Contest Guidelines:
Entries and payments must be received through Midway Journal‘s online submission manager under “Action/Words Poetry Contest.” You may submit an unlimited number of entries, but a new entry fee must be paid for each new submission.
Action/Words Poetry Contest seeks submissions that call for, enact, or reflect upon connections between poetry and praxis. Each fall, the Midway team will select a verb to serve as the “action word” and theme for that year’s contest. This year, we have selected the verb “to split.” We welcome writers to submit poems that respond directly or indirectly to the various meanings of this term.
Paste the title of your submission and your bio and contact information (name, mailing address, email address, etc.) in the cover letter box. Your name and contact information must not appear anywhere on the manuscript you upload.
Previously published work will not be accepted. Simultaneous submissions are permitted but must be withdrawn from the contest if accepted elsewhere.
Poetry: up to 3 poems per entry. Any style. No word limits. No more than one poem per page.
All submissions will be considered for publication.
Judge: Ana Božičević
Ana Božičević is a poet and writer. She grew up in Zadar, Croatia before coming to the States.
Her new book is New Life (Wave Books, 2023). She is also the author of Povratak lišća /Return of the Leaves, Selected Poems in Croatian (Hrvatsko Društvo Pisaca/Croatian Writers Society, 2020); Joy of Missing Out (Birds, LLC, 2017); the Lambda Award-winning Rise in the Fall (Birds, LLC, 2013), and Stars of the Night Commute (Tarpaulin Sky Press, 2009). She received the 40 Under 40: The Future of Feminism award from Feminist Press, and the PEN American Center/NYSCA grant for translating It Was Easy to Set the Snow on Fire by Zvonko Karanović (Phoneme Media, 2015). The anthology of translations The Day Lady Gaga Died: An Anthology of Newer New York Poets (Peti Talas/Fifth Wave) she co-edited with Željko Mitić appeared in Fall 2011.
Ana has a MFA in Poetry from Hunter College. At the PhD Program in English at The Graduate Center of the City University of New York she studied New American poetics and alternative art schools and communities, and edited lectures by Diane di Prima for Lost & Found: The CUNY Poetics Document Initiative. Ana has read, taught & performed at Bruce High Quality Foundation University, Bowery Poetry Club, Brooklyn Poets, Harvard, Naropa, San Francisco State University Poetry Center, the Sorbonne, Third Man Records, University of Arizona Poetry Center, and The Watermill Center. Her poetry workshops explore image, performance, and the lyric.
Ana has served on the board of Ruth Stone Foundation and loves their work at the Ruth Stone House in Vermont — check it out.
Judging Process:
The staff of Midway Journal will select a group of finalists from all the contest entries. Finalists will be chosen for strong work regardless of style and sent to the judge by February. The finalists will be sent to judge blindly. A winner will be announced in March and published in Midway.