Poetry
While Choeofpleirn Press dedicates three of its annual literary journals to short fiction, nonfiction, and drama, we accept poetry for all of the journals.
If you want your poetry published with short fiction, the deadline is the last Sunday of February every year to allow your work to be published in the Coneflower Cafe.
If you want your poetry published with nonfiction, both creative and scholarly, the deadline is the last Sunday of May to appear in the Glacial Hills Review.
If you want your poetry published with drama, both one-act plays and short screenplays, the deadline is the last Sunday of August to appear in Rushing Thru the Dark.
Poetry that you would like published and considered for the annual Derick Burleson Poetry Award must be accompanied by the $15 contest fee and be received no later than the last Sunday in August. Only the first place winner receives $100, although the best 20-30 poems will be republished in our Best of Choeofpleirn Press annual issue. Use the Paypal payment portal at the bottom of the page to pay the contest fee.
Published works whose poets have paid the contest fee will be considered for the poetry award. Poetry winners, including finalists, will be republished in the Best of Choeofpleirn Press issue in December. We will copyright each journal, and creators of each piece we choose to publish will receive a free pdf file of that published journal. Winners of the creative contests also receive a copy of the Best of issue.
If you want to submit works of different genres (i.e. art and fiction), please use separate emails for each genre to aid our email filing system.
For poetry, we are looking for lyric poems and narratives that display the writer's natural voice, that are as well written as prose, and that are drawn from the writer's own experiences. We find delight in such things as vivid images, strong similes, and playful use of metaphor. Poems in either an organic form or a traditional form are acceptable. Abstract or experimental poems are less likely to receive a close reading.
Among the moderns, we like such poets as Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell. Among the contemporary poets, our preferences include such poets as Ada Limon, Diane Seuss, Kim Addonizio, Sharon Olds, Pamela Stewart, Ruth Stone, Dorianne Laux, Laura Read, Elizabeth Tibbets, Jeanne Wagner, Paul Zimmer, Adrian C. Louis, Tony Hoagland, Joseph Millar, Ted Kooser, Roger Robinson, Yusef Komunyakaa, and Jack Gilbert.
Save your manuscript file with your surname and the words "poetry submission" in the title. Send only three poems (saved in one file) in one submission, and limit each poem to fifty lines or less. Send us your poetry manuscript(s) as one file as an attachment in doc, docx, or rtf to ChoeofpleirnPress@gmail.com. Anyone who writes work in Pages should have their work converted to doc, docx, or rtf. Poems in pdf are discouraged because transferring the poems into Office 365 ruins the formatting.
Include a short (100 words or less) biography, written in third person (i.e. Jane Doe writes...), for yourself with your submission, including author webpages or blogs, publication history and educational successes, or any other relevant information that you feel you should share with us about yourself. This biography will be published in the same journal that your work appears in, if your work is accepted for publication, so it is another great way for your readers to follow your successes.
Each submission must be written in English with non-English words italicized. We do not print works written in other languages, and we do not accept translations of works by other writers. Please do not use ALL CAPS anywhere other than for abbreviations. We also do not publish written works created with AI programming, which the U.S. Copyright Office has deemed non-copyrightable. Images transformed with digital programming are still acceptable, however.
We prefer that you do not send us works that are being considered for publication elsewhere, but, should your work be published somewhere else first, please notify us as soon as possible, so we can withdraw your work from our publication process.
Submission of your work to Choeofpleirn Press means you are allowing us to print and copyright your work for the magazine issue in which your work appears. Realize, though, that writers retain their ownership of their works, but, if a work we publish is republished elsewhere, we ask that you acknowledge our literary journal as your work's first publication. Note that, if your work comes in among the top three for our creative contests, it will be reprinted in our Best of Choeofpleirn Press annual magazine, as well. If you win the top spot for a creative contest, you also win $100.
Choeofpleirn Press editors are former English professors who understand the subjective and competitive nature of publication, but we promise to do our best to read every work as objectively as possible, and will never base our judgment on nationality, race, religion, or gender.
Use the Paypal payment box below (you can use your credit card, if you prefer by using the black debit/credit button) to submit your payments for the creative contest you would like to enter. Select which creative contest in which you would like to enter your manuscript.
Thank you for seeking a home for your creative work with Choeofpleirn Press!
If you would like to further assist our publication efforts, but would rather do so anonymously, please donate what you can.
Nominations--
**Best American Poetry**
Louise Kantro, "The Displacement of Loss," first published in Rushing Thru the Dark 2022.
Stan Sanvel Rubin, "Maybe When the Wind," first published in Coneflower Cafe 2022.
Stephanie Pritchard, "Teaching Sheena How to Booty Shake...," first published in Coneflower Cafe 2022.
**Pushcart Prize**
Suzanna C. de Baca, "I Forgot There Were Stars," first published in Rushing Thru the Dark, 2023.
Jane Richards, "The Mariana Trench, " first published in Glacial Hills Review, 2023.
Nancy Kennedy, "My Mother Standing," first published in Coneflower Cafe, 2023.
David Blumenfeld, "Wild Blackberries," first published in Coneflower Cafe, 2023.
Brian Daldorph, "Worker," first published in Coneflower Cafe 2022
Stephanie Pritchard, "Teaching Sheena How to Booty Shake...," first published in Coneflower Cafe 2022
Buff Whitman-Bradley, "Old Poets," first published in Rushing Thru the Dark 2022.
Diane Kendig, "My Second Class in Prison," first published in Coneflower Cafe 2021.
Gary Metras, "My Daughter's New Life," first published in Glacial Hills Review 2021.