AUSTIN POETRY SOCIETY
POETRY CONTEST RULES IN 2025
GENERAL RULES
ELIGIBILITY
SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS
QUESTIONS
GENERAL RULES
1. All contests must be funded in advance by the Austin Poetry
Society or by contest patrons before being published on the
APS Contests webpage.
http://www.austinpoetrysociety.org/contests
2. Patrons may be members or non-members of the Austin Poetry
Society.
3. Patrons should provide the following information per
contest:
a. Special Contest or Annual Contest
b. Contest Name
c. Contest Theme and Description (if any)
d. Required Style of Poetry (if any)
e. Line Limit
f. Number of prizes (usually 3, but 1 to 5 is okay)
g. Dollar amounts per prize
h. Patrons must state if they wish to judge the contest
OR have a judge assigned by the contest chair.
4. All contests will be judged anonymously, when possible.
The contest chair will collect entered poems, remove the
poets’ names, add codes and forward them to the judges.
5. Each contest must receive at least one more entry than
prizes listed or the contest will be cancelled. For
example, if 3 prizes are listed, the contest must receive
at least 4 entries.
6. Special contests may be offered for any full month in 2025.
Winners will be announced the following month.
7. Annual Contests should be published by May 31st and will be
open for entrees from August 1st through August 31st, 2025.
8. Annual Contest winners will be announced at the Annual
Awards Program in November 2025.
AUSTIN POETRY SOCIETY
POETRY CONTEST RULES IN 2025
ELIGIBILITY
1. Anyone who is currently an annual paid member or lifetime
member at the time of entry may compete in the contests.
2. Members may enter one poem per Special Contest. These must
be received by The Austin Poetry Society by the stated
deadline.
3. Members may enter as many Annual Contests as they wish,
however these must all be submitted at the same time.
Multiple submissions to the Annual Contests (i.e. for
different contests) are not allowed. Later corrected
submissions are not allowed.
4. Each entry must be an original work of the contestant.
5. A poem entered in one contest may not be entered, in whole
or in part, in any other contest.
6. Poems which have won 1st place awards in previous contests
(annual or special) may not be entered. A poem, in whole
or in part, which has been previously published in print
(including chapbooks) or electronic media may not be
entered.
7. Annual Contest Poems with the identification sheet must be
received by email by 11:59 pm on August 31, 2025.
SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS
1. Entries must be submitted by email in 2025 and sent to
austinpoetrycontest@gmail.com
2. Only one entrée per contest is allowed.
3. Entries may be submitted in email text OR as attached as an
updateable Word document with a .doc or .docx extension.
No other attachments will be accepted. PDF, JPEGS, GIFS,
or other extensions are not allowed.
4. Submissions in a Word document must be in a portrait format
with one-inch margins. Lines should be single-spaced and
use a 12-font size. The font should be a monospaced style
AUSTIN POETRY SOCIETY
POETRY CONTEST RULES IN 2025
such as Courier New. This will reduce the chance of errors
when copies are made for judging.
5. A one-line title does not count as a line. Any additional
title lines, subtitles, quotes, introductory quotes,
comments and footnotes count as lines.
6. All submissions must be in English unless specified
otherwise by the contest rules. Non-English words within a
poem are allowed, however judges are not required to know
these words.
7. Only one electronic copy of the poetry is required.
8. Annual Contest poems must list the contest number & contest
name with two blank lines before the poem’s title. The
poet’s name should appear after each poem; this will be
removed by the contest chair before judging.
9. Annual Contest poems must be preceded by an Identification
Sheet with this information:
APS Member Name
Mailing Address
Email Address
Phone Number
A List with the Number & Name of Contests entered
– each followed by the poem’s title
(or “first line in quotes” if untitled).
Example:
John Doe
123 Maple St, Austin, TX
john.doe@example.com
555-459-2222
#1 – Austin Poetry Society Award “Best Title Poem”
#2 – President’s Award “Another Example Title”
#5 – The Other Award “More Than Feathers”
QUESTIONS about the contests may be sent to the Contest Chair at
austinpoetrysociety@gmail.com
however please send all contest entrees to
austinpoetrycontest@gmail.com