SPRING SUMMER 2027 RESIDENCIES

MacDowell |📍Peterborough, NH

DEADLINE: September 10, 2026 at 11:59 pm EST

INFO: About 300 artists in seven disciplines are awarded MacDowell Fellowships each year and the sole criterion for acceptance is artistic excellence. MacDowell offers residencies at no cost to artists and provides need-based stipends to help cover expenses incurred during the residency, including rent, utilities, childcare, and lost income. Travel reimbursements are also available.

MacDowell encourages applications from artists of all backgrounds and all countries in the following disciplines: architecture, film/video, interdisciplinary arts, literature, music composition, theatre, and visual arts. Any applicant whose proposed project does not fall clearly within one of these artistic disciplines should contact the admissions department for guidance. We aim to be inclusive, not exclusive in our admissions process.

QUESTIONS? Please contact admissions@macdowell.org.

macdowell.org/apply/apply-for-fellowship

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fall 2026 guest residency

Woodward Residency |📍Ridgewood, Queen, NY

DEADLINE: September 13, 2026

INFO: Applications are now open for the Fall ’26 Guest Residency in Ridgewood, Queens.

Established and emerging creatives working in literary arts, design, film, and multidisciplinary arts are encouraged to apply for this free four-month workspace residency. They also have a silent player piano in the space for musicians and composers.

RESIDENCY DATES: October 5, 2026 — Jan 26, 2027

ELIGIBILITY: Established/emerging artists and creative professionals in the fields of literary arts, design, music, and multi-disciplinary arts are encouraged to apply.

Please note that art forms that generate fumes (such as oil painting) cannot be accommodated. Also, with the exception of our piano residents who can use headphones, our space is best suited to less cacophonous artistic pursuits.

AWARD BENEFITS:

Access to the building from 9AM-5 PM, Monday through Friday for the duration of your Guest Residency.
Guest Residents will work in the communal Great Room, with library etiquette.
Open invite to weekly tea and cake gatherings, and occasional work shares and evening parties.
A supportive and engaged community of working creatives.

woodwardresidency.co/guestresidency

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Call for submissions: all-poetry issue

Kweli Journal

DEADLINE: September 14, 2026

INFO: In this special NOVEMBER 2026 issue of Kweli, guest edited by ARIANA BENSON, we invite BIPOC writers to submit up to 10 pages of your poetry for an opportunity to be published in our inaugural all-poetry issue (125-150 pages).

Out of the selections published, Kweli editors will award to one contributor a week-long residency (winter, spring, or fall 2027), inclusive of a $1,000 stipend for travel and food, at Writers & Books’ bucolic Gell Retreat in New York States’s Finger Lakes region. All contributors will receive payment after publication.

BENSON is a southern Black poet-storyteller. Her debut poetry collection, Black Pastoral (University of Georgia Press, 2023) won the Cave Canem Poetry Prize, the Kate Tufts Discovery Award, and the Lenore Marshall Poetry Prize, and was a finalist for the National Books Critics Circle Leonard Prize and the Library of Virginia Prize in Poetry. Her poems and essays appear or are forthcoming in POETRY, Callaloo, Ploughshares, Poem-a-Day, The Kenyon Review, and elsewhere. Benson is a proud alumna of Spelman College, where she facilitates creative writing and storytelling workshops for students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities.

TIMELINE:

Deadline to submit: September 14, 2026
Contributors announced: October 15, 2026
Publication Date: November 2, 2026
Gell Resident announced: January 3, 2027

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

Submit up to three poems totaling no more than 10 pages in a single file in doc., rtf, or .pdf format.

PLEASE NOTE:

We do not consider submissions that endorse discrimination including racism, homophobia, sexism, and xenophobia, or feature gratuitous violence or sexual content.
We do not accept previously published work.
Simultaneous submissions are acceptable as long as they are indicated as such. Authors must immediately notify the editors if said work has been selected for publication in another periodical, either in print or online. Contact editors@kwelijournal.org
Payment is made after publication.
All published work will be archived online.

kwelijournal.submittable.com/submit

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Guggenheim Fellowship

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026 at 11:59 EST

INFO: The Guggenheim Fellowship is a mid-career award supporting the work of individuals who have made notable contributions to more than fifty fields across the arts, humanities, natural sciences, social sciences, and interdisciplinary areas.

Each year, roughly 200 Fellows are selected through a rigorous competition that assesses both past accomplishments and future plans. Recent success rates have averaged around 5%.

ELIGIBILITY:

Applicants must:

Be citizens or permanent residents of the United States or Canada
Be mid-career professionals who have made notable contributions to their field
Propose a significant project and demonstrate that they are prepared to complete it at the highest level of excellence
Apply as individuals or in pairs (i.e., two individuals working on the same project)

The following are not eligible to apply:

Individuals who have already received a Guggenheim Fellowship
Students currently enrolled in secondary, undergraduate, graduate, or postgraduate programs
Organizations, institutions, or other established groups

To learn more about the individuals we support, we recommend consulting the list of recent Guggenheim Fellows here.

gf.org/program/how-to-apply

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Graybeal-Gowen Prize for Virginia Poets 2026

Shenandoah

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026

INFO: Submissions are now open for the Graybeal-Gowen Prize for Virginia Poets 2026. Winners will be chosen by guest judge Denise Duhamel.

ELIGIBILITY: Poets living in or born in Virginia, as well as those who have lived in Virginia for two or more years in the past, are eligible.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES: Submit as many as three poems, each no longer than 50 lines, along with a brief biographical note, which should confirm the basis for eligibility as a Virginian.

All submissions will be considered for publication.

PRIZE: One poem will be selected to receive the $1000 prize and will be published in Shenandoah. No Washington and Lee staff, faculty, or their families are eligible.

The Graybeal-Gowen Prize was established to honor the memory of WLU graduate and lover of poetry, Howerton Gowen.

shenandoah.submittable.com/submit

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winter 2027 residency

Monson Arts |📍Monson, ME

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026

INFO: Monson Arts’ residency program supports emerging and established artists and writers by providing them time and space to devote to their creative practices. During each of our 2-week and 4-week programs throughout the year, a cohort of 5 artists and 5 writers are invited to immerse themselves in small town life at the edge of Maine’s North Woods and focus intensely on their work within a creative and inspiring environment. They receive a private studio, private bedroom in shared housing, all meals, and $500 stipend ($250 for 2-week programs). The Abbott Watts Residency for Photography offers access to the photography studio and darkroom of Todd Watts in nearby Blanchard, adjacent to the former home of Berenice Abbott. Click here to read more about this unique opportunity specifically for photographers.

Applications for a residency at Monson Arts are open to anyone at any stage of their career, working in visual arts, writing, and related fields (i.e. audio, video, photography, woodworking, movement, screen and playwrights). Open calls for residency applications currently take place 3 times throughout the year with deadlines on January 15, May 15, and September 15. Each application period corresponds to specific residency offerings 3-6 months out.

Residents’ studios are located in newly renovated Main Street buildings that have been designed specifically for visual artists and writers. All of our studio spaces are outfitted to be as flexible as possible so that we can accommodate a variety of creative practices. Our visual arts studios are spacious and light-filled with large work tables and sinks. Shelving and portable storage carts are available as needed. Access is available to woodshop and metal shop facilities in nearby buildings for any fabrication needs. Our writing studios are comfortably furnished with work tables, office chairs, bookshelves, and reading chairs. For those working in time and sound based media: apply to the Writing category if quiet contemplation would be best for your project or the Visual Arts category if you need room and the opportunity to make and play sounds out loud.

Residents live in newly renovated historic homes throughout town, within walking distance to studios and everything that downtown Monson has to offer. These are mostly 3 bedroom structures that are fully furnished and comfortable all four seasons of the year. Houses all have shared kitchens, bathrooms, and common areas with laundry machines, telephone, and other amenities as well. Wifi is available in all of our buildings through high speed fiberoptic service.

WINTER RESIDENCY SCHEDULE:

1/11 – 1/21 – 2 Week Residency
1/25 – 2/18 – Residency (With Abbott Watts Resident)
2/22 – 3/18 – Residency

APPLICATION REQUIREMENTS:

Up to 5 images / 5 minutes of media OR 5 pages of writing examples
A letter of intent for your time at the residency (3000 Characters)
C.V. or Resume (limited to 6000 characters)
Two reference names

monsonarts.org/residencies/overview/

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open call for Presenting: Featuring Emerging Writers

Poetry Northwest

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026

INFO: Presenting is a print feature in which Senior Editor Xavier Cavazos introduces readers to a poet whose work has never before been featured in a nationally distributed print journal. All writers whose poetry has not been featured or is not forthcoming in a nationally distributed print journal may submit up to four poems at a time.

Please wait for a response before submitting again. All work submitted in this category will be considered for general publication even if not selected for the Presenting feature. Please read our general guidelines before you submit. Please help us to ensure that we take to press a magazine that reflects the tremendous diversity of the contemporary poetry community by including in your cover letter any relevant information that you feel would aid us in this mission.

poetrynorthwest.submittable.com/submit

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call for submissions

WE THE SOIL

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026

INFO: WE THE SOIL publishes poetry, nonfiction, & photography that was nurtured in creative community—whether your work started in a workshop with a beloved teacher, received feedback from a writer/artist-friend, or was inspired by the work of a writer/artist you admire.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

Poetry:

Please submit one poem in a .pdf or .doc/.docx file by September 15, 2025—or until 100 responses have been submitted. Please title the document as your initial/s - the title of your poem (Example: YR - The Poem Wants More). We prefer to read submissions in Times New Roman.
Use this form to submit. *This form will be closed once we receive 100 submissions.
In the form, you will find questions that will prompt you to tell us about yourself and your creative work.
For your submission, be prepared to write a brief explanation of how the work you are submitting was seeded or grown in community. If your work is selected, we will include this as a brief Community Note that explains how a person, group of people, or organization helped nurture your poem. You can also think of it as a public thank you note for the person/people/organization who supported or influenced your work.
We welcome simultaneous submissions. *Please email us at wethesoil.submissions@gmail.com to let us know as soon as your work is accepted elsewhere. This is also where you can direct any questions related to your submission.
We want to highlight new/recent writing, so we will not be publishing work that has already been published/curated in a literary magazine. We do accept work that has been shared on social media, in a newsletter or personal blog, in a reading, etc.
Decisions will go out by October 15, 2025. If your work is chosen for publication, you will be invited into an engaged editorial process that will involve looking at your work with care in preparation for publication. Everyone who is not selected for publication will receive a personalized note that includes one piece of encouraging feedback.
All submissions are free, and we welcome donations starting at $1. All funds collected from submissions will go directly toward paying another writer/artist. Please do not donate if you are experiencing financial hardship.

Nonfiction:

Please submit one nonfiction piece (we welcome creative nonfiction!) in a .pdf or .doc/.docx file by September 15, 2025—or until 50 responses have been submitted. Word limit is 5,000 words. Please title the document as your initial/s - the title of your work (Example: YR - On Poetry). We prefer to read your work in Times New Roman.
Use this form to submit. *This form will be closed once we receive 50 submissions.
In the form, you will find questions that will prompt you to tell us about yourself and your creative work.
For your submission, be prepared to write a brief explanation of how the work you are submitting was seeded or grown in community. If your work is selected, we will include this as a brief Community Note that explains how a person, group of people, or organization helped nurture your nonfiction piece. You can also think of it as a public thank you note for the person/people/organization that supported or influenced your work.
We welcome simultaneous submissions. *Please email us at wethesoil.submissions@gmail.com to let us know as soon as your work is accepted elsewhere. This is also where you can direct any questions related to your submission.
We want to highlight new/recent writing, so we will not be publishing work that has already been published/curated in a literary magazine. We do accept work that has been shared on social media, in a newsletter or personal blog, in a reading, etc.
Decisions will go out by October 15, 2026. If your work is chosen for publication, you will be invited into an engaged editorial process that will involve looking at your work with care in preparation for publication. Everyone who is not selected for publication will receive a personalized note that includes one piece of encouraging feedback.
All submissions are free, and we welcome donations starting at $1. All funds collected from submissions will go directly toward paying another writer/artist. Please do not donate if you are experiencing financial hardship.

Photography:

Please submit 4-5 photos (JPEG files) by September 15, 2025—or until 25 responses have been submitted. Please title your photos as your initial/s following the number of the photo. For example: YR 1, YR 2, etc. You can feel free to add titles for the photos after that. For example, YR 1 - Bright Eyes.
Use this form to submit. *This form will be closed once we receive 50 submissions.
In the form, you will find questions that will prompt you to tell us about yourself and your creative work. We will for a one-paragraph artist statement that speaks to the sample of work you are submitting.
For your submission, be prepared to write a brief explanation of how the work you are submitting was seeded or grown in community. If your work is selected, we will include this as a brief Community Note that explains how a person, group of people, or organization helped nurture your nonfiction piece. You can also think of it as a public thank you note for the person/people/organization that supported or influenced your work.
We welcome simultaneous submissions. *Please email us at wethesoil.submissions@gmail.com to let us know as soon as your work is accepted elsewhere. This is also where you can direct any questions related to your submission.
We want to highlight new/recent writing, so we will not be publishing work that has already been published/curated in a literary magazine. We do accept work that has been shared on social media, in a newsletter or personal blog, in a reading, etc.
Decisions will go out by October 15, 2026. If your work is chosen for publication, you will be invited into an engaged editorial process that will involve looking at your work with care in preparation for publication. Everyone who is not selected for publication will receive a personalized note that includes one piece of encouraging feedback.
All submissions are free, and we welcome donations starting at $1. All funds collected from submissions will go directly toward paying another writer/artist. Please do not donate if you are experiencing financial hardship.

wethesoil.com/submissions

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CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: ISSUE 27: ‘BELONGING’

FEELS Zine

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026

INFO: When we have the space to truly be ourselves so much can change. How does it feel to find our people? To thrive in community, exactly as we are? To feel connected to something much larger than us? How do we create space when it doesn’t yet exist? And when we don’t feel we belong, what does it mean to stand in otherness, unapologetically? At the intersections of safety, acceptance, and love, we find something magic, something worth holding onto: belonging.

Issue 27: Belonging also marks FEELS ’ 10 year anniversary! We selected this theme to mark the occasion to celebrate the wonderful community that has been created around us over the last decade: the readers, the contributors, the performers, and the supporters. To quote Heartstopper’s Tao Xu, “The love that connects us will never break. We built it. And it built us." We love you!

ISSUE RELEASED: January 2027 (with a big party!)

Please read the information below before you submit. Please send all submissions to submittofeels@gmail.com with a short bio and description of your work.

COMPENSATION: Each accepted submission will receive a $25 honorarium and a free copy of the issue.

We accept:

Writing: poetry, personal essays, fictional stories, interview proposals.
Visual Art: photography, illustration, art, collage, comics, typography.
Have an idea for a submission not listed above? Send us an email with your proposal, we’re eager to read it.

Before submitting, please read our COMMUNITY GUIDELINES.

We welcome (and encourage) people of all diverse experiences, abilities and communities to submit their work. Your voice is important, and we would like to support it. The more voices we hear, the more we can learn from one another.

Keep up to date by following us on Instagram & Facebook or signing up for our newsletter.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

Please title your email submissions using the following: "FEELS Submission - Issue ___ - [Your name as it should appear in the issue if accepted] - Title of Submission"
If submitting a collection of works, please submit all in one email with the name of the collection as the title. If submitting multiple separate works for the same issue, please submit each individually.
Art submissions: please include a short artist statement to support the work you are submitting. FEELS is 6.5" x 9.5" with a 0.125" bleed. Feel free to submit lores proofs. Should your work be accepted, we will need a hires version at 300dpi for print.
Longform written submissions: the maximum word count for submissions is 1200 words. Please submit as a word document or using Google Docs, no PDFs. Please note: due to team capacity, we cannot accept manuscripts or written works over the word limit for excerpt selection
Poetry/prose: please keep submissions to 2 poems or less, unless they are part of a single collection of work (max 4 poems). Please submit as a word document or using Google Docs, no PDFs.
Please include a short bio, a statement about your submission, and the country you are submitting from. We publish a majority Canadian content as a Canadian publication, but do include global contributors as well. As we prioritize stories and art based on lived experience, please also include a statement of your personal connection to the issue topic.

Please send all submissions to submittofeels@gmail.com. If you do not receive a reply to your email confirming it has reached us, please follow up with our main email, hellofeelszine@gmail.com.

We accept previously published work, as long as it will not be published in another Canadian independent magazine during the chosen issue's publication period (January-July or July-January). We don't want to step on anyone's toes by printing the same material at the same time. We can include attribution if the publication requires it.

We kindly request submissions are limited to one or two works due to the high volume of submissions we receive, and please have patience with us in responding to new emails--we promise to reply to each and every one.

feelszine.com/pages/submissions

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2026/2027 Rajat Neogy Editorial Fellowship for african writers

A Long House

DEADLINE: September 15, 2026

INFO: We at A Long House are delighted to announce our call for applications for the 2026/2027 Rajat Neogy Editorial Fellowship. It is to continue in our commitment to foster editorial talent in Africa that we are putting out this call yet again, the fourth since the fellowship was founded in 2021. We hope to keep developing and expanding the fellowship through the years, inspiring and nurturing a robust community of editors in Africa and its diaspora.

We consider editing a vital part of a vibrant literary ecosystem, as great editors not only polish writing but also elevate and define it. They help writers see more clearly the paths their work is skirting or vaguely gesturing at, surrounded, in a manner of speaking, by jungly growth, and help them cut through with greater dexterity. They leave any piece of writing wiser, richer, and more capacious, able to hold within it the largeness and complexity of experience. This is work that must be undertaken with the utmost seriousness, itʼs a space whose filling must not be abandoned to the arbitrary flow of things.

This is why A Long House encourages Africans who love literature and the art and discipline of editing to apply for the 2026/2027 Rajat Neogy Editorial Fellowship. And it is instructive that for the fellowship, we follow in one of the finest traditions and lineages of editing on the continent, begun by Rajat Neogy, the founder and editor of Transition, one of the most reputable literary magazines to come out of Africa. Founded in Uganda in 1961 when he was only 22, Transition, under the editorial guidance of Rajat Neogy, went on to publish some of the finest writers from Africa—Chinua Achebe, Es’kia Mphalele, Wole Soyinka, Bessie Head, Ngũgĩ wa Thiong'o, among others—sometimes for the very first time.

This fellowship is a way to honor his work, dedication, and memory. Transition as an institution (now under the aegis of the Hutchins Center for African and African American Research at Harvard University) alongside Rajat Neogy’s family have agreed with us that this is an important history that needs to be preserved. The rigour and insight he brought to editing are touchstones for us as we continue in his footsteps.

And so again, we encourage Africans who care about literature and quality editing to apply for the 2026/2027 Rajat Neogy Editorial Fellowship at A Long House.

HERE’S HOW IT WILL WORK:

Fellows for the 2026/2027 tenure will be announced in October 2026.
There will be a $1000 award for the fellowship, a tote bag of books, and a period of mentorship with a select writer or editor of repute.
Fellows will work with A Long House throughout the one year tenure of the fellowship, at the end of which, theyʼll be expected to produce a chapbook of no more than 50 pages.
The chapbook will be conceived and edited by the fellows, and it could be a work of essays, poems, or fiction, or a creative blend of all of these. The fellows will edit, not write the chapbooks. For the chapbooks, the fellows will be allowed creative freedom. This means they can have the chapbooks incorporate or make as its subject criticism, theory, photography, or art.

ELIGIBILITY:

All who are applying:

Should be between 18 – 40 years old.
Should be Africans residing in Africa.
Must demonstrate a deep interest in African literature and the ecosystems that nurture it.

RESPONSIBILITIES OF THE WRITER:

Work with founding editors on soliciting, commissioning and editing the work of contributors.
Cultivate and nurture relationships with contributors. This includes managing communication with contributors.
Manage A Long House's editorial and publication calendar.
Curate The Dispatch, A Long House's monthly newsletter.
Work with founding editors on annual issues and other projects.
Work with A Long House team on the Long Talk and A Short Talk series.
Conceptualise, edit and publish a chapbook of not more than 50 pages.

alonghouse.submittable.com/submit

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CULLMAN CENTER FELLOWSHIP

New York Public Library

DEADLINE: September 25, 2026 at 5pm ET

INFO: The Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers is an international fellowship program open to people whose work will benefit directly from access to the collections at the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building—including academics, independent scholars, and creative writers (novelists, playwrights, poets). Visual artists at work on a book project are also welcome to apply. The Center appoints 15 Fellows a year for a nine-month term at the Library, from September through May. In addition to working on their own projects, the Fellows engage in an ongoing exchange of ideas within the Center and in public forums throughout the Library.

A Cullman Center Fellow receives the use of an office with a computer, full access to the Library’s physical and electronic resources, and a stipend of $90,000.

SCOPE: The Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers offers Fellowships to people whose work will benefit directly from access to the research collections at the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building at Fifth Avenue and 42nd Street. Renowned for the extraordinary comprehensiveness of its collections, the Library is one of the world’s preeminent resources for study in anthropology, art, geography, history, languages and literature, philosophy, politics, popular culture, psychology, religion, sociology, sports, and urban studies.

CRITERIA + TERMS: The Cullman Center’s Selection Committee awards fifteen Fellowships a year to outstanding scholars and writers—academics, independent scholars, journalists, creative writers (novelists, playwrights, poets), translators, and visual artists. Foreign nationals conversant in English are welcome to apply. Candidates for the Fellowship will need to work primarily at the Stephen A. Schwarzman Building rather than at other divisions of the Library. People seeking funding for research leading directly to a degree are not eligible.

The Cullman Center looks for top-quality writing. It aims to promote dynamic communication about literature and scholarship at the very highest level—within the Center, in public forums throughout the Library, and in the Fellows’ published work.

A Cullman Center Fellow receives a stipend of $90,000, the use of an office with a computer, and full access to the Library’s physical and electronic resources. The Library expects Fellows to work at the Cullman Center five days a week, Monday through Friday, for the duration of the Fellowship term, which runs from September through May. Each Fellow gives a talk over lunch on his or her current work-in-progress to the other Fellows and to a wide range of invited guests, and may be asked to take part in other programs at The New York Public Library.

nypl.org/about/fellowships-institutes/cullman-center-scholars-writers

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South Asia Speaks Fellowship

South Asia Speaks

DEADLINE: September 30, 2026

INFO: South Asia Speaks is committed to cultivating the artistic and professional growth of South Asian writers wherever in the world they may be. They offer a free, year-long literary mentorship program for novelists, nonfiction writers, poets, and translators.

Fellows receive six one-on-one mentorship sessions, along with craft-focused workshops, masterclasses with renowned writers, and access to a vibrant community of fellows and alumni. There are no hidden costs—just a commitment to storytelling, mentorship, and the power of literary community.

APPLICATION PROCESS: Applicants are required to complete an application form, submit a 5,000-word writing sample in the same genre of the proposed project, and provide details for one reference.

ELIGIBILITY:

The Fellowship is open to writers who identify as South Asian. Writers may be based anywhere in the world.
The Fellowship is for writers working in English. Novelists and non-fiction writers, including Oral History applicants, are required to have an active project in progress. Poets and translators may apply with just a proposal, but all applicants must submit a writing sample.
If you are applying for translation, please indicate whether the work has already been translated. If it has, explain why you believe a new translation is necessary. While we do not require prior permission to translate the work, we ask that you let us know if you have made any effort to obtain it. Please include these details in your application.

southasiaspeaks.org/fellowship/

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JANUARY - MARCH 2027 RESIDENCIES

Elf School of the Arts |📍Hayesville, NC

DEADLINE: September 30, 2026 at 11:59pm ET

APPLICATION FEE: $10

INFO: Applications for January-March residencies at Elf School of the Arts are open September 1-30!

Accepted mediums are book arts, drawing, forging, jewelry/casting/lapidary, mixed media, music, painting, papermaking, photography, printmaking, textiles, weaving, welding, woodworking, and writing.

Residencies range from 1-12 weeks, hosting 4 artists at a time, at no charge. Each resident receives a private bedroom and studio, with a shared kitchen and living space - creating an intimate, focused environment for deep creative work and meaningful exchange.

pci.jotform.com/form/262368100253146

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2027 APR/Honickman First Book Prize

American Poetry Review

DEADLINE: October 1, 2026 at 11:59 pm

INFO: The prize of $3,000, with an introduction by the judge and distribution of the winning book by Copper Canyon Press through Consortium, will be awarded in 2027 with publication of the book in the same year. The author will receive a standard book publishing contract, with royalties paid in addition to the $3,000 prize. This year's final judge is poet Terrance Hayes.

Terrance Hayes’s newest books include a collection of poems, So To Speak (Penguin, 2023), a collection of essays, Watch Your Language (Penguin, 2023), American Sonnets for My Past And Future Assassin (Penguin, 2018) and To Float In The Space Between: Drawings and Essays in Conversation with Etheridge Knight (Wave, 2018). To Float In The Space Between was winner of the Poetry Foundation’s 2019 Pegasus Award for Poetry Criticism; American Sonnets for My Past And Future Assassin won the Hurston/Wright 2019 Award for Poetry. Hayes is a Silver Professor of English at New York University.

The prize is open to poets who have not published a book-length collection of poems with a registered ISBN. Poems previously published in journals or limited-edition chapbooks may be included in the manuscript, but the entire manuscript itself must not have been published as a book-length work. Translations are not eligible nor are works written by multiple authors. The editors of The American Poetry Review will screen manuscripts for the judge. APR complies with the CLMP Code of Ethics in the administration of this contest. The judge will select a manuscript in an anonymous review process and will not award the prize to any writer whose personal relationship to the judge poses a conflict of interest.

To be considered for the prize, submit a manuscript of 48 pages or more, paginated, with a table of contents and acknowledgments.

Manuscripts must be received by October 1, 2026. The winning author and all other entrants will be notified by January 15, 2027.
You may simultaneously submit your manuscript elsewhere, but please notify us immediately if it is accepted for publication. Submission of more than one manuscript is permissible; each must be entered separately.
The winning author will have time to revise the manuscript after acceptance, but please send no revisions during the reading period.

americanpoetryreview.submittable.com/submit/2170/apr-honickman-first-book-prize

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2027 Fellowship

Lighthouse Works |📍Fishers Island, NY

DEADLINE: October 1, 2026

APPLICATION FEE: $25

INFO: Lighthouse Works is seeking applications for our 2027 fellowship season.

Our Fellowship Program supports cultural practitioners working at the vanguard of their creative fields. We welcome applications from artists working across a wide range of disciplines and are best equipped to accommodate visual artists, writers, choreographers, and composers.

Fellowships are six weeks in length and take place on Fishers Island, New York. Fellows receive room and board, private studio space, and a $1,750 stipend. Artistic excellence is the primary criterion for selection.

Fellows live together in our residence, where each has a private bedroom and shares the kitchen, bathrooms, and common spaces. The house is kept stocked with food, with dietary needs accommodated, and on most evenings, our team prepares dinner for the Fellows and joins them at the table.

Our studios sit beside Silver Eel Cove, where the ferry arrives and departs Fishers Island. Each Fellow has a private studio with abundant natural light and views of the water.

While in residence, Fellows’ primary responsibility is the pursuit of their work. We ask only that each Fellow participate in an Artist Talk during the opening weekend of the fellowship and an Open Studio at the session’s conclusion.

HOW TO APPLY:

Artists at any stage of their careers are encouraged to apply through our online application system.

Applicants are asked to complete an application form, submit work samples, and provide a CV and work sample statement.

Lighthouse Works staff reviews applications for completeness before they are evaluated by independent juries of artists, writers, and other experts in the relevant fields. The juries identify a group of finalists, who are invited to interview before final selections are made. All applicants will be notified of the committee’s decision by the notification date listed for the application period.

Artistic excellence is the primary criterion for acceptance into the Fellowship Program.

lighthouseworks.us/fellowship

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2026 John Lewis Writing Grants

Georgia Writers

DEADLINE: October 1, 2026, at 11:59 pm ET

SUBMISSION FEE: $0

INFO: The Georgia Writers Association's John Lewis Writing Grants are inspired by the late civil rights icon and his more than three decades of service as Georgia’s 5th District representative. The John Lewis Writing Grants will be awarded annually in the categories of fiction, creative nonfiction, and poetry.

The purpose of the John Lewis Writing Grants is to elevate, encourage, and inspire the voices of promising Black writers in Georgia. Applicants must be emerging writers who are Black or African-American residents of Georgia for at least one year, or full-time students at a Georgia college or university at the time of application and on the date of the award. Writers who are eligible may apply annually but may only win the John Lewis Grant one time.

PRIZE: The winning recipients will receive $500, and an invitation to read from their work at the 2027 Red Clay Writers Conference, held in October on the Marietta Campus of Kennesaw State University.

QUALIFICATIONS: Applicants must be at least 18 years of age and emerging writers who are Black or African-American residents of Georgia for at least one year, or full-time students at a Georgia college or university at the time of application and on the date of the award. Applicants are ineligible if they have published more than one traditionally published book. Promising writers without publication will be considered. Writers who are eligible may apply annually but may only win a grant once. There is no submission fee to enter. Applicants are ineligible if they are of relations to any of the Georgia Writers staff or board of directors.

GUIDELINES:

Writers may apply in only one genre and must submit the following:

A completed grant application.
An artist statement of 500 words (max.) as a concise description of your work and goals as a writer. Tell us what inspires your writing career, and how your work engages (directly or indirectly) with the legacy of John Lewis.
A writing sample of 10 pages (max.) of a published or unpublished piece in the genre in which you are applying: fiction, creative nonfiction, or poetry. If submitting poetry, one poem per page please.

*Do not include your name or any identifying information in the writing sample.

**We will not accept submissions of AI-generated work, which includes writing that was partially created with or assisted by LLM technology. If an AI submission is identified, it will be rejected.

georgiawritersassociation.submittable.com/submit/364214/2026-john-lewis-writing-grants

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call for POETRY

Foglifter

DEADLINE: October 1, 2026

INFO: Foglifter provides a path to representation for a broad selection of LGBTQ+ voices, centering queer and trans literary artists of color, youth, elders, and those beyond traditional LGBTQ+ cultural centers so that our readers and audiences can see their own experiences authentically represented through queer and trans literary arts.

We believe that queer and trans people must curate our own artistic discourses and we curate with a commitment to not perpetuate harm in our communities and recognize our responsibilities as editors to uplift the voices of queer and trans people while not punching down on those of us who live at the intersection of multiple oppressed identities.

This issue's guest poetry editor is Meredith Nnoka, a Chicago-based poet, educator, and prison abolitionist. She is the author of Les Portes, winner of the 2025 CAAPP Book Prize, and the chapbooks I Could Never Be Your Woman and A Hunger Called Music. Meredith teaches poetry in carceral facilities and has received fellowships from Lambda Literary, Illinois Humanities, and VONA. Twice nominated for Best of the Net, her poems have appeared in Diode Poetry Journal, Four Way Review, The Massachusetts Review, and elsewhere.

GUIDELINES:

Submission must adhere to the following guidelines:

Submit a maximum of 5 pages
Individual poems can be longer than one page, but the entire submission cannot exceed 5 pages.
Each new poem must start on its own separate page.
Include all poems in a single Word document (and put the titles of your poems, separated by commas, in the title field).
No AI submissions — if a submission is suspected or found to be AI generated, it will be declined and we will not consider your work in the future.
Please do not withdraw a piece and resubmit it with minor edits, changes to your cover letter, or adjustments to your file name. When you withdraw a piece, it does not withdraw from the submission cap and it takes space from other submitters. If your piece is selected, you will have the chance to make minor revisions later on. We appreciate your understanding!
For grant purposes, we cannot consider submissions that do not include a completed demographic survey with their submission.
Because of the high number of submissions, we have capped this project at 500 submissions, so please submit sooner rather than later!

foglifter.submittable.com/submit

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2027 fellowship

Amplify Arts |📍Omaha, NE

DEADLINE: October 4, 2026

INFO: Amplify’s Fellowship program champions artists working outside conventional art spaces to investigate the layered civic histories, cultural traditions, and living ecologies that shape our region. Designed to support site-responsive installations, book and publishing projects, films, performances, and other publicly engaged project-based work, the Fellowship provides $10,000 in project support, individualized project mentorship, and feedback in a small cohort-based learning environment.

For the 2027 Fellowship, preference will be given to projects that engage with the theme of Migration by exploring how movement shapes our communities, environments, and collective futures. We welcome project-based work that examines migration not only as the movement of people, but also as the circulation of ideas, languages, labor, waterways, seeds, species, capital, and culture.

We especially encourage projects that invite public participation or engagement. This may take the form of site-responsive installations, performances, workshops, or other shared experiences, as well as the circulation of books, printed matter, films, digital media, archives, or other forms of knowledge. We value projects that create opportunities for people to encounter, contribute to, or engage with ideas in ways that foster dialogue, learning, and reflection outside conventional art spaces.

FELLOWSHIP: The Fellowship is one year beginning in January of 2027 and ending in January of 2028. Fellows are expected to actively participate in all regularly scheduled cohort meetings and contribute to a culture of generosity, curiosity, and shared learning. Prospective applicants should approach this program willing to expand their practice with curiosity and critical feedback from other Fellows and mentors.

Fellows will be paired with mentors from outside the Omaha area early in the program in a matchmaking process that responds to each artist’s questions, methods, and ambitions. Mentors will be selected from a pool of curators, artists, and arts professionals with substantial experience in developing project-based work.

ELIGIBILITY: Any artist, artist collective, or collaborative group maintaining a residence within the Omaha/Council Bluffs Metro Area, including Washington, Douglas, Cass, Sarpy, and Saunders counties in Nebraska, and Pottawattamie, Mills, and Harrison counties in Iowa, is eligible to apply.

Applicants must be at least 19 years old and submit a complete application, including an Artist Statement, Project Description, Project Budget, Work Sample, and Works Cited page to be considered. A formal education is not required to apply.

Collectives and collaborative groups with a significant history of working together are also eligible.

TIMELINE:

September 8, 6:00 pm - 7:00 pm: Virtual Application Information Session
September 15, 12:00 pm - 2:00 pm: Virtual Application Office Hours
September 17, 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm: Virtual Application Office Hours
October 4, 11:59 pm: Application Closes
October 5 - October 18: Application Review
October 19 - October 23: Applicant Interviews
October 30: Application Status Updates Delivered

amplifyarts.org/events-blog/2027-fellowship