Our 2022 open poetry competition is open to poets of all levels until 31st August 2022 (midnight UK time).  Entries can be on any subject. Entries will be shortlisted and judged anonymously.

Competition Prizes

Winner: £125 & Featured in the Steel Jackdaw magazine

Runner Up:  £50 & Featured in the Steel Jackdaw Magazine

Third Prize:  £25 & Featured in the Steel Jackdaw Magazine

Friendship Prize: £25 & Featured in the Steel Jackdaw Magazine

A long shortlist will be compiled by Josephine Lay (Director of Operations for the Gloucestershire Poetry Society & Editor for Black Eyes Publishing UK).

Josephine will also choose the winner of the Friendship Prize of £25 from competition entries by Friendship Members.

We are pleased to announce that Tom Sastry will be judging the 2022 Open Poetry Competition.

Hera Lindsay Bird calls Tom Sastry a magician of deadpan. He has just published the eagerly awaited You have no normal country to return to – a darkly comic exploration of national identity and the power of modern myths. It follows A Man’s House Catches Fire (2019) which was highly commended in the Forward Prize and shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney First Collection Prize. His pamphlet Complicity (2016) was a Poetry School Book of the Year and a Poetry Book Society pamphlet choice.

Submission Criteria

The Open Poetry Competition is run by Black Eyes Publishing UK on behalf of the GPS

• Entries can be on any subject
• Entries must be submitted online.
• Entries will be shortlisted and judged anonymously
• You can enter any number of poems.
• Entries can be withdrawn by notification in writing.
• Entry fees will not be refunded.

Format

• Submission dates are from, 1 st June 2022 to 31st August 2022 (midnight).

• All poems must have a title and must not exceed 40 lines in length (excluding title).

• Lines between text or stanzas not counted.

• Entries can be on any subject.

• Poems must be the entrant’s original work and not have been published, in any form, elsewhere.

• Do not send illustrated poems.

• Font should be 11pt, black.

• Each poem should be on a separate Microsoft Word Document (.doc or .docx). Do not send PDF’s

• The file name should be the title of the poem only, exactly the same as in the document.

• Do not include your name in the document or on the file title or it will be disqualified.

• No corrections can be made after receipt, nor fees refunded.

• Ideally, we would ask that you avoid dual submissions. However, we do recognise having poems tied up awaiting a decision can be difficult for poets. So, should a poem you have submitted to us be subsequently placed or published elsewhere, we should be notified immediately and the poem withdrawn. No fees refunded.

• Please email Poems (as an attachment) to the email address provided below after payment with the subject line, 2022 Open Poetry Competition. Include your name in the email.