Learn about the Colorado Prize for Poetry book contest
The Colorado Prize for Poetry is an international poetry book manuscript contest established in 1995. Each year’s prizewinner receives a $2,500 honorarium and publication of his or her book by the Center for Literary Publishing.
The Colorado Prize for Poetry adheres to the following Contest Code of Ethics, as adopted by the Council of Literary Presses and Magazines, of which the Center for Literary Publishing is a longtime member: “CLMP’s community of independent literary publishers believes that ethical contests serve our shared goal: to connect writers and readers by publishing exceptional writing. We believe that intent to act ethically, clarity of guidelines, and transparency of process form the foundation of an ethical contest. To that end, we agree to 1) conduct our contests as ethically as possible and to address any unethical behavior on the part of our readers, judges, or editors; 2) to provide clear and specific contest guidelines — defining conflict of interest for all parties involved; and 3) to make the mechanics of our selection process available to the public. This Code recognizes that different contest models produce different results, but that each model can be run ethically. We have adopted this Code to reinforce our integrity and dedication as a publishing community and to ensure that our contests contribute to a vibrant literary heritage.”
Current Winner
We are very pleased to announce that Asha Futterman's Song of Gray has been selected by final judge Craig Morgan Teicher as the winner of the 2025 Colorado Prize for Poetry. Her book will be published by The Center for Literary Publishing at Colorado State University in November 2025.
Asha Futterman is an actor and poet from Chicago. She holds an MFA in poetry from Washington University in St. Louis. Her chapbook, empathy, was published by The Song Cave in 2024. Her work appears or is forthcoming in Poetry, Bennington Review, Conduit, and The Journal. She currently teaches children in Brooklyn.
We'd also like to congratulate our 2025 Colorado Prize for Poetry finalists:
Mike Bagwell, "When We Look at Things We Steal Their Color and Grow Heavy Under Their Weight"
Aimee Cervenka, "The Family Ghost"
Cady Favazzo, "Even the Parts I Promised to Myself"
Joanne Godley, "How the Black Panthers Fell From the Sky"
Melanie Han, "No Way of Returning Home"
AT Hincapie, "What Survives a Fire"
Rochelle Hurt, "Lightboxes"
Karla Kelsey, "Isolation Songs"
Mickie Kennedy, "Let It Be the Bird"
Whitney Koo, "Cry Sower"
Priyanka Kumra, "Borderlands: Cartography of Longing"
David Leftwich, "at dawn, the first of the first to sing"
Lisa Lewis, "Present and Future Storm"
Meher Manda, "Some of Many Women"
Angelo Mao, "A White Horse Is Not a Horse"
Derick Mattern, "Name the Walls Yourself"
Nick Minges, "Feeling Extremely Fatigued in California"
Sara Lupita Olivares, "BEAM"
Samuel Piccone, "Domestica"
Megan Shevenock, "Who Thinks About You"
Maria Surricchio, "Even in Winter"
Hans Wagner, "Time Enough Lands"
Mat Wenzel, "Telling the Bees"
Submission Guidelines
Contest Procedures
When your manuscript arrives (if you submit by mail), it is logged into our Colorado Prize database by our office assistant. The top cover sheet (with your name and address) is removed and filed away until the contest is over. Identities of authors submitting their manuscripts online are not visible to any of the judges.
Once all the entries have been received--whether paper or electronic--and the authors’ identities removed, they are divided among six to eight (depending on the total number of entries received) outside preliminary judges; the Center does not use interns to judge for this contest. Each preliminary judge will select three to four manuscripts (depending on the number of preliminary judges we require), for a total of twenty to twenty-four finalists. If a judge recognizes the work of a colleague, student, or friend, he or she contacts the Center and that manuscript is sent to another judge.
The final judge then receives the finalists from which to select the winner. If the final judge wishes to see additional manuscripts from the preliminary judges, he or she may request them; the judge is not, however, permitted to request specific manuscripts. Friends, colleagues, and students (current or former) of the judge are not eligible to compete, and the judge agrees to refrain as well from selecting any manuscript that presents a conflict of interest (selecting, for example, a manuscript he or she has helped to develop)
Frequently Asked Questions
If your question hasn’t been answered here, e-mail us at creview@colostate.edu or give us a call at 970-491-5449.