For poets who are spending the long winter evenings reading, revising and combining their poems into collections, here’s an updated list of upcoming contest entry deadlines:

• Perugia Press Prize for a first or second book by a woman (postmark deadline November 15)
• Howard Nemerov Sonnet Award (postmark deadline November 15)
• Yale Series of Younger Poets Award (postmark deadline November 15
• Crab Orchard Series in Poetry Open Competition Awards (postmark deadline November 16)
• Poetry Business Book & Pamphlet Competition (postmark/online entry deadline November 29)
• The Motherwell Prize for a first or second book by a woman from Fence Books (postmark deadline November 30)
• A. Poulin, Jr. Poetry Prize from BOA Editions, Ltd. (postmark deadline November 30)
• Bright Hill Press Poetry Book Competition (postmark deadline November 30)
• The Motherwell Prize from Fence Books (postmark deadline November 30)
• The Plough Prize Poetry Competition (postmark/email deadline November 30)
• Patricia Grodd Poetry Prize for Young Writers from Kenyon Review (online submissions only, deadline November 30)
• The Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize from Waywiser Press (postmark deadline December 1)
• Beatrice Hawley Award from Alice James Books (postmark deadline December 1)
• Missouri Review Audio & Video Competition (postmark deadline December 1)
• Meridian Editor’s Prize in Poetry from the University of Virginia (online submission only, deadline December 15)
• Gival Press Poetry Award (postmark deadline December 15)
• The Dorset Prize from Tupelo Press (postmark or online submission deadline December 31)
• Pavement Saw Press Chapbook Contest (postmark or online submission deadline December 31)
• The Colorado Prize for Poetry from Colorado State University’s Center for Literary Publishing (postmark deadline January 14)
• Andrés Montoya Poetry Prize from Letras Latinas at the University of Notre Dame (postmark deadline January 15)
• John Ciardi Prize for Poetry from BkMk Press at the University of Missouri Kansas City (postmark deadline January 15)
• Grayson Books Chapbook Contest (postmark deadline January 16)
• Cleveland State University Poetry Center Prizes, First Book competition and Open Competition (postmark deadline February 15)
• Kathryn A. Morton Prize in Poetry from Sarabande Books (postmark deadline February 15)
• New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition from Finishing Line Press (postmark deadline February 15)
• National Poetry Series (postmark deadline February 16)
• Robert E. Lee Wilson & Ruth I. Wilson Poetry Book Award from Margie Review (postmark deadline February 27)
• Fence Modern Poets Series (postmark deadline February 28)
• The American Poetry Journal Book Prize from Dream Horse Press (postmark deadline February 29)

Required reading before you submit to any contests:
"What's Really Wrong with Poetry Book Contests?," by David Alpaugh
How to put together a poetry manuscript for publication
"A Word To the Wise: On entering your poems in competition," by Kurt Heintz
"You Do It Because You Love It," by S.A. Griffin

Related resources:
More contest links

Our friend Michael Rothenberg is involved in an interesting journey this fall: Rockpile, a collaboration with David Meltzer “in the tradition of the troubadour and with the spirit of improvisation and collaboration,”—the two poets have been travelling across the U.S. performing poetry composed on the road “in a spontaneous fusion with local musicians.” They started the tour last month in Los Angeles & Albuquerque, and this week they’ve made it all the way across to Washington, D.C. and New York City—if you can’t make it to any of the cities where they are performing, you can follow the tour on the Rockpile blog, which has the poets’ road musings, performance videos, and more. The whole thing is meant to conclude with “a final grand performance” in San Francisco. Keep on truckin’, poets!

More postings on poetry/music collaborations:
Poetry and Music, Sister Arts Allied (2007)
Listen to the woodlark’s song: “Lullula” (2006)
Jazz & poetry on the road together in Copenhagen, Amsterdam & London (2005)
Are songs poetry? (2004)
Poetry + music, an inspired collaboration (2004)
Caught in the Act, The making of a live poetry + music CD, by Whitman McGowan (2004)
Ngoma: Entering the Dreamtime with Music and Poetry (2002)

IBPC judge Majid Naficy recently announced his choices in the October competition—once again, none from our Poetry Forum, but as always, interesting reading:

• In first place, he selected “Rain” by Anna Yin, a poem that infuses elemental natural forces with life, chosen by Naficy because “That’s how beauty prevails itself.”
• In second place, he chose “a smooth satirical poem about a ‘forbidden’ love, “Forbidden Lullaby” by Walter Schwim.
• In third place, Majicy put “Without Salt” by Mandy Pannett, a poem that “rests on memory.”
• He also awarded an honorable mention without commentary to one poem: “Bills and Yet More Bills,” a light piece of word-play by Christopher T. George.

And for the November competition, we’re proud to announce three very fine poems entered representing our Poetry Forum:

• “On Preparing to Play Bach Again” by Guy Kettelhack (GuyBlakeKett), a poem that captures the musician’s experience of great music with both subtlety and energy.
• “Johnny Two Bows” by Abigail Weatherspoon (mapovia), an elegiac tale of a man destroyed by the experience of war that sounds like a country western song but has nothing in it of cliche.
• S. Radhamani’s “A Long Wait,” a poem that leaps from the momentary sensations and observations at a bus stop to a symbolic analysis of its society.

Kudos and luck in the judging to all three poets! Please remember to keep your nominations coming in. Any time you see a poem on the Forum that you think would be a worthy envoy to the IBPC, go right to the InterBoard Poetry Competition folder and post it. Address your post to the poet whose work you are nominating—this ensures that the poet will be notified of your nomination, and can post the required permission and information before it’s time for Poetry Guide Margy Snyder to choose the next month’s three entries.

More on the IBPC:
General information
Requirements for IBPC nominees
Anthology of the monthly IBPC winning poems
Archive of poems entered in the IBPC from our Poetry Forum
Background information and reading links for October - December IBPC judge Majid Naficy

I’ve spent the last month in St. Andrews, Scotland—a much more northerly latitude than my home in San Francisco—and the turning of the season has been that much sharper. The days are hours shorter now than a month ago, and especially since Britain set the clocks back with the end of summer time last weekend (the US doesn’t go off daylight savings time until next weekend), I’m experiencing the carpe diem impulse every afternoon. Grab hold of every single daylight hour, because it will all too soon pass into darkness! So I’ve gathered a collection of classic poems on the theme of time’s passage and the impulse to seize the day, intensify your living as the days shorten into winter:

• Carpe Diem Poems