Trick-or-treating may not be on the table this year, but October’s final writing contests may offer their own sweet rewards. Each of these opportunities awards a prize of $1,000 or more, with a deadline of October 31. Good luck!

American Poetry Review Honickman First Book Prize: A prize of $3,000 and publication by American Poetry Review is given annually for a first poetry collection. The winning book is distributed by Copper Canyon Press through Consortium. Ada Limón will judge. Entry fee: $25.

Comstock Review Chapbook Contest: A prize of $1,000, publication by the Comstock Writers Group, and 50 author copies is given annually for a poetry chapbook. Michael McAnaney will judge. Entry fee: $30.

Conduit Books & Ephemera Minds on Fire Open Book Prize: A prize of $1,000, publication by Conduit Books & Ephemera, and 30 author copies is given annually for a book of poetry. The editors will judge. Entry fee: $25.

Elixir Press Poetry Award: A prize of $2,000 and publication by Elixir Press is given annually for a poetry collection. John Nieves will judge. Entry fee: $30.

Finishing Line Press Open Chapbook Competition: A prize of $1,000 and publication by Finishing Line Press is given annually for a poetry chapbook. All entries are considered for publication. Entry fee: $15.

Indiana Review Blue Light Books Prize: A prize of $2,000 and publication by Indiana University Press is given in alternating years for a collection of poetry or a collection of short fiction. The 2021 prize will be awarded in poetry. The winner will also receive travel expenses to read at the 2021 Blue Light Reading in Bloomington, Indiana. Entry fee: $20.

PEN/Faulkner Foundation Award for Fiction: A prize of $15,000 is given annually for a book of fiction published during the current year. Four finalists will each receive $5,000. The winner and finalists will also be invited to read in Washington, D.C., in May 2021. Entry fee: none.

Persea Books Lexi Rudnitsky First Book Prize: A prize of $1,000 and publication by Persea Books is given annually for a first poetry collection by a woman who is a U.S. citizen or permanent resident. The winner also receives a six-week, all-expenses paid residency at the Civitella Ranieri Center in Umbria, Italy. Entry fee: $30.

Poetry Society of the United Kingdom National Poetry Competition: A prize of £5,000 (approximately $6,350) and publication on the Poetry Society of the United Kingdom website is given annually for a single poem. A second-place prize of £2,000 (approximately $2,540) and a third-place prize of £1,000 (approximately $1,270) are also given. The winners will also be published in Poetry Review. Poems written in English by poets from any country are eligible. Neil Astley, Jonathan Edwards, and Karen McCarthy Woolf will judge. Entry fee: £7 (approximately $9) for one poem, £4 (approximately $5) for each additional poem.

Red Hen Press Benjamin Saltman Poetry Award: A prize of $3,000, publication by Red Hen Press, and a four-week residency at PLAYA in Summer Lake, Oregon, is given annually for a poetry collection. Jeffrey Harrison will judge. Entry fee: $25.

Red Hen Press Quill Prose Award: A prize of $1,000 and publication by Red Hen Press is given annually for a short story collection, a novel, or an essay collection by a queer writer. Amber Flame will judge. Entry fee: $10.

River Teeth Literary Nonfiction Prize: A prize of $1,000 and publication by University of New Mexico Press is given annually for a book of creative nonfiction. Megan Stielstra will judge. Entry fee: $27.

Tupelo Press Sunken Garden Chapbook Poetry Prize: A prize of $1,000, publication by Tupelo Press, and 25 author copies is given annually for a poetry chapbook. Entry fee: $25.

Tucson Festival of Books Literary Awards: Three prizes of $1,000 each are given annually for works of poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction. The winners will also receive scholarships to attend a workshop at the Tucson Festival of Books in March 2021. Entry fee: $20. 

University of North Texas Press Vassar Miller Prize: A prize of $1,000 and publication by University of North Texas Press is given annually for a poetry collection. Entry fee: $25.

Visit the contest websites for complete guidelines, and check out the Grants & Awards database and Submission Calendar for more contests in poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction.

In Ten Meter Tower, a short film by Maximilien Van Aertryck and Axel Danielson featured in the New York Times, participants climb a ladder to a ten-meter-high diving board at a public pool, calculating their risks and fears before they decide to jump into the water or head back down to safety. The tight shot of the diving board, the self-motivating monologues, and the slow-motion recordings of the jumps are captivating. “Our objective in making this film was something of a psychology experiment: We sought to capture people facing a difficult situation, to make a portrait of humans in doubt,” say the filmmakers. Write a poem that imagines what thoughts and feelings would run through your head (and body) before and after a leap from the board into the water.

If you have sincere interest in Black New Orleans, the Louisiana Creole language, and how language summons us to grapple with history—Brenda Marie Osbey is my first recommendation. Osbey is the author of books in English and French, most recently, 1967 (William & Mary, 2018), All Souls: Essential Poems (LSU Press, 2015), and History and Other Poems (Time Being Books, 2013). For more than thirty years she has researched and recorded the history of Faubourg Tremé, a community founded by free Blacks in New Orleans. From 2005 to 2007, Osbey served as the first peer-selected poet laureate of Louisiana. I had an opportunity to speak with Osbey about her appointment as poet laureate, her writing process, and her advice for writers.

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You were the second Black woman to be selected for the role of poet laureate of Louisiana. What lessons, if any, did you learn from this public role?
Because my spring 2005 appointment was the first one recommended by a committee of literary peers, I began by considering how I might best serve beyond the expected class visits that dominate most laureateship tenures. Then Katrina hit New Orleans on the 29 of August as a Category 1* hurricane, after which the levees broke, flooding the city of New Orleans and the surrounding area.

During my two-year laureateship, I traveled the United States, advocating for the right to return and rebuild, speaking on disaster panels, giving mini-versions of the Black New Orleans Research Seminar I had been teaching at universities across the country in the years before the storm. For a while, there was a narrative floating about that New Orleans was not worth rebuilding or saving in any way that would be deemed costly. I sought to dispel this notion in various ways. Additionally, every week I gave readings, and met and engaged with southeast Louisianians—mostly New Orleanians—dispersed across the country, bearing with them their narratives of displacement. It was a wrenching and humbling experience. And it taught me countless lessons about the far reach of community.

In a 1986 interview in the Mississippi Quarterly, you were asked if the New Orleans community was supportive of your work and mentioned that although you love the city, you do some of your best work away from here. You also made a distinction between New Orleans being an arts city and a cultural city. Do you still feel the same way today, and how has that impacted your work?
I was attempting to convey how, despite the city’s long history of cultural/creative output, there was no structure or system in place in New Orleans to support the arts—beyond the entertainment model, that is—which would include supporting arts workers. Which is a longer conversation than is possible here.

Rooted as it is in New Orleans—history, culture, language, sensibilities—writing often requires the kind of distance that allows one to see and consider one’s objectives and materials differently away than at home. Seeing the forest for the trees is necessary to thought, insight, and reflection, and is required to produce work.

Out of all your amazing books, which was the most difficult to write and why?
I don’t think in terms of difficulty or ease. My work is primarily research-based, and each book is a deliberately conceived project with its own arc and progression. And since I’m always working on multiple projects at any given time, my attention is either on the work at hand, what’s next in queue, or some combination.

What’s your advice to young poets?
Learn to read one or more languages. Moreover, study your native language as if learning it for the first time. More so than other genres, poetry is rooted in the human tongue.

Listen to Osbey read “Everything Happens to (Monk and) Me”:

The deadline is approaching for the inaugural Malinda A. Markham Memorial Prize in Translation, presented by Saturnalia Books. Established in the memory of poet and translator Malinda A. Markham, this annual prize awards $2,000 and publication by Saturnalia Books to a manuscript of a female poet’s work, translated by a female translator.

Using only the online submission system, submit a cover letter and a manuscript of at least 48 pages with an entry fee of $25 by October 31. Manuscripts featuring the work of multiple female poets are ineligible, but manuscripts may have multiple translators, so long as all collaborators identify as female. The editors will judge. Visit the website for complete guidelines.

Founded in 2002 by the poet Henry Israeli, Saturnalia Books seeks to publish both new and established poets and to “encourage the publication of literature of a noncommercial and challenging nature.” In addition to the Markham Memorial Prize, the press offers two other awards for poetry manuscripts: the Saturnalia Books Poetry and Editors Prizes.