MWC announces 2013 winner of annual poetry chapbook prize

MWC is thrilled to announce the winner of the 2013 MWC Press  Poetry Chapbook Contest…

Our esteemed judge, Gale Marie Thompson, has selected THE POLYCHROME CLINIC by Caroline Crew as the winner of the 2013 Susan K. Collins/Mississippi Valley Poetry Chapbook Contest. Congratulations Caroline!

We had a terrific group of manuscripts to read and it was wonderfully difficult to select a group of finalists to send ...to our 2014 judge, Gale Marie Thompson.

2013 Poetry Chapbook Prize Judge
Gale Marie Thompson

 

Chapbook Prize Finalists:
Rachel J. Bennett — Mural Quadrant
Erin M. Bertram — The Salvaging
Jaime Brunton – Opera on TV
Caroline Crew & Chris Emslie — Your Stupid Fortune Gives Me Stupid Hope
T. M. De Vos – Finishing
Iris Jamahl Dunkle — 500 Days
Diane LeBlanc — Sudden Geography
Lesley Ann Wheeler – Misery Diaries

Pre-orders will be available soon on the MWC website. We are hoping that THE POLYCHROME CLINIC will be available later this spring and we will be sending copies out as soon as we have them.

Thank you very much again for the opportunity to everyone who submitted for giving us the opportunity to read your work, to our terrific readers & hero judge Gale Thompson & to our winner & newest MWC Press author Caroline Crew!

 

Past winners of the MWC poetry chapbook competition have included Meghan Brinson, Stephen Frech, Sandra Marchetti, Cindy Hunter Morgan, Ryan Walsh, and Monica Wendel.

Submissions for the 2013 Susan K. Collins Poetry Chapbook Contest open through Sept 30

The Susan K. Collins/Mississippi Valley Poetry Chapbook Competition invites submissions of chapbook collections of poetry.  Submissions are open May 1-September 30. The winner will be announced online via MWC this fall.  The winning manuscript will be published by MWC Press in the spring of 2014, and the author will receive 15 copies plus a cash prize of $100.

The judge for this year's competition is Gale Marie Thompson, the author of Soldier On (Tupelo

Gale Marie Thompson

Press, forthcoming) and the chapbooks If You’re a Bear, I’m a Bear (H_NGM_N, 2013) and Expeditions to the Polar Seas (Sixth Finch, 2013).  Her work can also be found in the Best New Poets 2012, Denver Quarterly, Columbia: A Journal of Literature and Art, Volt, Salt Hill, inter|rupture, diode, H_NGM_N, and others.  She received her MFA at the University of Massachusetts and is a PhD candidate at the University of Georgia in Athens.  She is the creator and editor of Jellyfish Magazine, and works at the Georgia Review.

Past winners of the chapbook competition have included Meghan Brinson, Stephen Frech, Sandra Marchetti, Ryan Walsh, and Monica Wendel.   

Read Local to feature Trisha Georgiou August 7

Quartered Enlightenment
(Poolboy Publishing, 2013)

Poet and writer Trisha Georgiou Nelson will read from her new chapbook of poetry, Quartered Enlightenment (Poolboy Publishing, 2013) Wednesday, August 7, from 7-8:30 p.m. in the Malmros Conference Room of the Bettendorf Public Library as part of Read Local. She will also share her journey and experiences in writing the collection. Her other works include "Show Up" in the MWC Creative Writing Primer (MWC Press, 2012) and she serves as the MWC Board vice president. 

Follow her @Trisha_Georgiou     

Allowing Your Work to Take on Life and Breath

Poet and writer Trisha Georgiou Nelson is the author of "Show Up" in the MWC Creative Writing Primer (MWC Press,

Quartered Enlightenment
(Poolboy Publishing, 2013)

2012) and serves as the MWC Board vice president. Quartered Enlightenment is a chapbook of her poetry set for release this summer (Poolboy Publishing, 2013).  @Trisha_Georgiou

    Nearly a decade ago, I penned a poem entitled Waiting in Winter. I filed it away with my other unpublished and unseen works. She Who Questions Life was composed soon thereafter. Next, Winter Solstice was written. The poem, The Garden Gate, came into consciousness and found its way onto paper. All of these poems and other written works, along with scrap pieces of paper, post-it notes, and napkins from restaurants and coffee shops with ideas, thoughts, and possibilities, all managed to take refuge in the Drawer of Creative Chaos.

     Each of these poems is an individual. None of them at the time were related. They existed together in that drawer for many years. Did they converse? Did the energy of the ideas mesh together? Now, I wonder.

     On a lovely late spring afternoon I was tending to the roses in my Shakespearean garden, when creativity struck and a question came into my conscious thoughts. How do the plants feel as they live through each season? In winter, do they long for spring? Do they miss the warmth from the sun? It was at that moment I felt drawn to open the Drawer of Creative Chaos and revisit my forgotten works. It was not only a surprise, or maybe utter disbelief, but I saw an order to the chaos. These poems had connectivity and a purpose together. This is the exact moment my chapbook, Quartered Enlightenment was conceived. Although, at this moment it was only a spark of energy, a possibility without a title, or a heartbeat, or breath.

     The next few months this fetus of a book began to form and develop into chapters each relating to a distinct season and feeling. The gestation period seemed endless. The momentum slowed in my mind to nothing. Later, I would realize it was only a time of waiting for the stars to align and the season to change.

     I am not sure if it was the poems or the heavens that guided me to the publisher who had the foresight to see the end result. Quartered Enlightenment was granted a name, a body, a life, and a spirit.

     The path to publication never comes as quickly as we wish it would. Through perseverance and patience, and allowing your work to take on life and breath, the final outcome is miraculous.

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Starts today!

MWC Creative Writing Primer Kindle Giveaway June 27-29! #collinsconference

 

Take note: Collins Conference faculty Erin Bertram has two forthcoming chapbooks in 2013

Erin Bertram

Faculty member for the 2013 David R. Collins Writers' Conference, Erin M. Bertram, is the author of nine chapbooks. Inland Sea, won the Robin Becker Chapbook Prize, and two are forthcoming in 2013: from The Vanishing of Camille Claudel (Seven Kitchens Press, forthcoming 2013) and Memento Mori (Dancing Girl Press, forthcoming in 2013). 

 

She holds an MFA in Creative Writing and a Graduate Certificate in Women, Gender, & Sexuality Studies from Washington University in St. Louis, and has led writing workshops for a variety of organizations, including St. Patrick Center and the Midwest Writing Center.  She is an Instructor and Faculty Tutor at Augustana College, where she co-coordinates the campus Safe Zone program.