Mark Fischer Poetry Prize
The Mark Fischer Poetry Prize is named in the memory of Telluride’s much-loved poet, lawyer, skier and raconteur. Mark Fischer was a daring experimenter who combined a polyglot’s command of languages with a quirky sense of humor and a passion for obtuse words. In that spirit, prizes are awarded to entries that best exhibit the qualities of originality, novelty, complex meaning, linguistic skill and wit. The wilder the better. All styles and content matter are accepted and will be represented at the reading.
The prize is open to poets residing in Arizona, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico. The judging is blind, meaning the judge has no personal information attached to the poems. The judge will make decisions based on the overall quality of the work and the above values.
We are very honored to have Wayne Lee, the 2012 winner, as our 2013 judge.
The Mark Fischer Poetry Prize Reading and Awards Night
Telluride Arts hosts the Mark Fischer Poetry Prize Celebration annually, usually in in May. Winning Poets, our Judge and other Poets read their poems.
SUBMISSIONS
POETRY SUBMISSIONS ARE DUE FRIDAY, APRIL 5, 2013
Telluride Arts in Telluride, Colorado invites submissions to the fifteenth annual Mark Fischer Poetry Prize.
Awards of $200 first prize, $150 second prize, and $100 third prize, and $50 honorable mention will be presented at a celebratory reading in Telluride in May.
Submission Guidelines
Submission to the contest grants one-time use rights of publication to Telluride Arts on our website, in local papers and in any future anthology of work. Copyright is retained by the author.
We need the following three items from you:
1. REGISTRATION FORM
- Please fill out and submit the form on this page.
2. POEMS
- You may submit as many poems as you choose.
- Please submit each poem on its own page.
- Please do not include your name on your poem pages.
- Email your poems as attachments to info@telluridearts.org. In the subject area, write Mark Fischer Poetry Prize Submission.
3. PAYMENT
- PAY NOW
- Include $5 for each poem you want considered.
Email submission is preferred. If you would like to submit by mail, please send a cover letter that includes required information (in the form right) to Telluride Arts PO Box 152, Telluride CO 81435.
THE 2012 JUDGE - Colorado Poet Kierstin Bridger
Kierstin Bridger – Kierstin is the 2011 winner of the Mark Fischer Poetry Prize.
Her poetry can be found online at the Copperfield Review, Thrush Literary Journal, OccuPoetry, Telluride Watch, and The Mountain Gazette. She has forthcoming award winning poetry in the June issue of Memoir (and). She was a finalist for 2011 Haiku Year in Review by Broadsided Press.
Her short fiction can be found in The Porter Gulch Review, Smith magazine’s 6 Words about Work, Bricolage, Stripped: A Collection of Anonymous Flash Fiction edited by Nicole Monaghan and at the best of Nail Polish Stories, a tiny and Colorful Literary Journal.
She is a regular contributor to Telluride Inside and Out. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in English from the University of Washington and is currently pursuing an MFA in poetry at Pacific University in Oregon. She divides her time between Telluride and Ridgway Colorado with her high school sweetheart and their daughter. She writes, blogs, designs, and rolls her eyes at the new puppy in her house.
THE 2012 WINNERS
FIRST PLACE: WAYNE LEE
Wayne Lee’s poems have appeared in Tupelo Press, Slipstream, The Floating Bridge Anthology, Red Bird Press Broadside Series, New Mexico Poetry Review, and other journals and anthologies. His collections include Doggerel & Caterwauls: Poems Inspired by Cats and Dogs (Red Mountain Press), Twenty Poems from the Blue House (co-authored with his wife, Alice Lee,Whistle Lake Press) and the forthcoming Leap, Float. Lee (wayneleepoet.com) lives in Santa Fe, where he works as an educator and journalist.
SECOND PLACE: JULIE SHAVIN
Julianza (Julie) Shavin, writer, composer, and visual artist, is a Kentucky native residing in Colorado Springs, She has had three poetry books published: “The Snake Will be There Soon” “In the Air, Against the Air,” and “Of Mortality a Music.” She is at work on a fourth collection tentatively entitled “An Octave Above the Sea.” She publishes regularly in print and e-zines. She served as president of Poetry West (www.poetrywest.org) 2011-2012, and edited its (nationally-advertised) anthology “The Eleventh Muse” during that time. After four years of performing at “way-too-many” venues, she was awarded the Pikes Peak Arts Council’s “Performance Poet of the Year” award in September 2011. She has three children, four pets, and is an animal rights advocate/activist. She will volunteer with reading, listening, piano-playing and pet therapy for SolAmor Hospice starting this July.
THIRD PLACE: BETH PAULSON
Beth Paulson writes and leads poetry and creativity workshops in Colorado where she has lived since 1999. Before that she taught English at California State University for over twenty years. She has also been a columnist for the Ouray County Plaindealer. Beth currently leads, Poetica, a bimonthly poetry workshop for Ridgway-Ouray area writers. Beth’s poems have appeared widely in over a hundred literary magazines, including most recently Common Ground Review, Innisfree, Wild Goose Review, Passager, and The Eleventh Muse. She has been nominated for Pushcart Prizes for poetry in 2007, 2009 and 2011, and was a Best of the Net nominee in 2011. Her poems are also included in several national anthologies, including Crazy Woman Creek: Women Rewrite the American West (Houghton Mifflin, 2004) and What Wildness is This: Women Write About the Southwest (University of Texas Press, 2007), and What’s Nature Got to Do With Me?” (Native West Press, 2011). Beth is the author of three poetry collections: Wild Raspberries (Plain View Press, 2009), The Company of Trees (2004) and The Truth About Thunder (2001), both by Ponderosa Press. You can read more poems on her website, www.wordcatcher.com. An avid hiker and Nordic skier, Beth lives in the shadow of Whitehouse Mountain in Ouray County, Colorado.
FOURTH PLACE: ELLEN METRICK
Ellen Marie Metrick - Meadowlark. Swale. Half-full pond. Lone peak with snow, or summer-stripped. Coyote at dawn, fox yap in punch drunk dark. Breath. Dust devil. Text on newsprint, cardstock; conglomeration — clear moments, glue smudge, lips, arms, feet. We shadows always offend those who dare not listen.
HONORABLE MENTION: EMILY ROSE KORN
A resident of Telluride for the past four years, Emily Rose Korn Koren is proud to call the mountains her home. Emily completed her master’s degree in International Administration from The University of Denver in 2008. Her thesis, “Contra Su Voluntad: Indigenous Women’s Health in Rural Peru” was published by the University of Denver’s International Human Rights Advocacy Center. Emily recently appeared in the Telluride Theatre productions of William Shakespeare’s As You Like It (Touchstone) and The Merchant of Venice (Gratiano). She is a contributing writer for Colorado-based music magazine Mousike and her radio show, “Every Rose has its Korn” airs live on KOTO every other Monday evening. Emily and her dog Eis can be found playing in the San Juans on skis, skates, skate skis, SUPs, or anything made from duct tape. Emily works at the New Sheridan Chophouse and resides in Ophir.
HONORABLE MENTION: SAMANTHA TISDALE WRIGHT
Samantha Tisdel Wright is a community journalist writing in the San Juan Mountains of southwestern Colorado. She has won numerous awards from the Colorado Press Association over the past several years for her work in the Ouray County Plaindealer, where she was formerly managing editor. She is currently a reporter with The Watch, a regional Telluride-based newspaper. Best recent assignment: a day at the Ouray Ice Park with San Juan Mountain Guides. Adventure these days comes mostly in the form of raising two red-headed children, Morgan and Molly. Samantha is still trying to figure out a way to make a living (or at least live) that incorporates her three passions: writing, yoga and travel.
