To celebrate the arrival of National Poetry Month, we’re running the spring edition of the Tupelo Press Poetry Project as a contest, though you don’t have to win the contest to be chosen for the on-line journal.

This time we’re using as a prompt a poem by former Dorset Prize finalist Anne Marie Rooney, whose new book, Spitshine, is coming from Carnegie Mellon Press.

Anne Marie Rooney’s poem: Last Evening: Index of first lines, is as advertised, a (brilliant) collection of first lines. Chose one-to-three of those first lines as the first line of one-to-three of your own poems. What happens after that first line is entirely up to you. There are no other rules. You may submit up to three poems (per entry) through our Submission Manager, for a reading/entry fee of $15. Poems should be submitted in a single Word document, one poem per page. (Sorry, we cannot accept mailed or emailed entries.) Short bio optional.

Our editors for the spring issue are Nancy Naomi Carlson and Athena Kildegaard, who will select first ($350), second ($250) and third place ($150) winners, five honorable mentions, and the balance of the issue.

The deadline for submissions is June 30, 2011.

Submit poems to our submission manager and payment to PayPal

http://www.tupelopress.org/
http://www.tupelopress.org/poetryproj.php

Click on the link above and go to the contest official site