April/May 2024
Crosswinds is grateful to have had a record year for submissions, receiving 1,802 poems from around the country. We’re thankful too, that so many accomplished poets are sending their work to us, alongside some newer voices. We’re delighted and privileged to discover new talent.
About our three winning poets for the 2024 Crosswinds Poetry Contest:
Grand Prize – $1,000: Patricia Davis
Patricia Davis is a playwright and poet. Her work has appeared in Image, Poet Lore, Hayden’s Ferry Review, Smartish Pace, Crab Creek Review and other journals and has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize. She received her MFA from American University, where she was a Lannan Fellow, and she works in human rights advocacy in Washington, DC
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Second Prize – $500: John Glowney:
John Glowney’s poetry has appeared, more recently, in Narrative, Canary; Catamaran; Baltimore Review; the Shore; Cloudbank, Rattle, the Bitter Oleander, and in a full-length collection, Visitation (Broadstone Books, 2022). He is a recipient of a Pushcart Prize, Poetry Northwest’s Richard Hugo Prize and the Poetry Society of American’s Robert H. Winner’s Memorial Award. A graduate of the University of Michigan, he lives in Seattle.
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Third Prize – $250: Kendall Pakula:
Kendall Pakula lives in Atlanta, Georgia where she works as a writer for a digital agency. Her work has been published in Blue Lyra Review and Burntdistrict (Sparkwheel Press). She plans to pursue an MFA in Poetry in 2025.
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February/March 2024
Featured Poet:
John Peter Beck
John was a finalist in the 2023 Crosswinds Poetry contest.
John Peter Beck hails originally from near the shores of Lake Michigan in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. He is a professor in the labor program at Michigan State University where he co-directs a program on labor history and the culture of the workplace, Our Daily Work/Our Daily Lives. His poetry has been published in a number of journals including Atlanta Review, The Seattle Review, Another Chicago Magazine, The Louisville Review and Passages North.
John’s Covid project, The Work of Saints, was a series of nearly sixty poems exploring the intersection of occupations and the Catholic patron saints associated with them. Nearly thirty of the series have been published in the last three years.
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December 2023/January 2024
Featured Poet:
Frank Paino
Frank Paino’s poems and collections have been singled out for awards a number of times. In Crosswinds’ 2023 poetry contest, Frank was awarded third prize for his poem “Turkey Buzzard Gospel.”
Frank Paino earned an MFA from Vermont College of Fine Arts. His manuscript, Pietà, was the winner of the 2023 Jacar Press Chapbook Competition and is forthcoming. Frank’s third collection, Obscura, was published by Orison Books in 2020. He has received a Pushcart Prize, The Cleveland Arts Prize in Literature, and an Individual Excellence Award from the Ohio Arts Council. His poems have appeared in a variety of literary publications, including: Crab Orchard Review, Catamaran, North American Review, World Literature Today, The Briar Cliff Review, Lake Effect and a number of anthologies
Links & Upcoming Readings:
Website: https://www.frankpaino.net
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/frank.paino.poet
Check Frank’s website closer to dates for specifics:
27 April 2024: Verse-Virtual (online) reading with Lise Goett and Jennifer Franklin.
General Statement About Writing:
Note: This is adapted from my poem, “Muse,” based on Laura Christensen’s multimedia piece by the same name.
On Writing:
The Muse is not one to speak unless spoken to, and still she’ll make you work for it, every time, hip deep in aquamarine as you let the ancient lake close over you. It’s up to you to do the breaking, where the twinned weights of time and water press the veiled light of our histories into a lexicon for what it means to be alive on this ravishing planet we refuse to stop breaking. It will be the new tongue you speak when, finally breathless, you take what you can carry—haul yourself back into light.
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November 2023
Featured Poet:
Robert Clinton, of Dedham, MA.
As many of you know, Robert was awarded the $1,000.00 Grand Prize-in Crosswinds’ 8th annual poetry contest.
We were thrilled that Robert was able to come to Rhode Island and perform his poem at our annual celebration book launch.
About Robert Clinton:
Robert earned an MFA from Goddard College and has twice been a fellow at MacDowell. His poems have appeared in Wisconsin Review, Stand, Shenandoah, Antioch Review, Ploughshares, among others. In 2022, Robert won the Yeats Poetry Prize; and we at Crosswinds were thrilled to award his poem (one of over 1,500) Grand Prize earlier this year. He lives in Dedham, Massachusetts where he has a woodshop in his basement.
Robert is the author of two poetry collections poetry, Taking Eden (Sarabande Books 1998), and Wasteland Honey (Circling Rivers Press 2021), both available at Amazon.
Robert had this to say about poetry:
I wrote once that “poetry is the code of common elements transmuted into history and fortune.” These days I’m not so sure how coherent the history is, and I’m not sure that fortune is paying attention. The words on the page seem weaker and more confused. But I will say there is nothing in my life as powerful as writing a poem which I admire and I aim to continue the search. I depend upon it; I do practically nothing else. And I can’t help hoping for a big payback.
To read the reviews or purchase Robert Clinton’s newest book, Wasteland Honey, please visit Circling Rivers Press at: circlingrivers.com
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