writing contests

“Lament of the North Atlantic Right Whale” Wins First Place for Poetry in Blue Institute’s 2020 Words on Water Contest

/ saraletourneau / 4 Comments

Blue Institute Words on Water 2020 winners

 

A remarkable thing happened last week: One of my poems won a writing contest!

“Lament of the North Atlantic Right Whale” received first place in the Poetry category for the Blue Institute‘s 2020 Words on Water Writing Contest. The main criteria for this contest, which also has categories for prose and playwriting, is that the entered pieces should involve water, since Blue Institute’s mission is clean water and ocean conservation. You can read “Lament,” as well as the other winning pieces, now at BI’s 2020 Words on Water results page. (Once the page loads, “Lament” is the first piece below the contest logo.)

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Let’s Talk Numbers: Poetry Acceptances and Rejections (Plus, Four Ways to Stay Motivated After Your Writing Is Rejected)

/ saraletourneau / 5 Comments

When I was preparing my final poetry submission of 2018 during the last week of December, a surprising question popped into my head: “How many submissions did I send out this year?”

You see, I don’t set goals for a certain number of submissions each month or year, especially since poetry is still a part-time endeavor for me. Instead, I continually write and revise my poems, read various journals, and submit to places that I think would be a good fit for my work. And while I track my submissions, it’s mainly to remind myself of the facts, like which publications I’m waiting to hear from and which poems are currently out on submission.

So, for those reasons, I really had NO idea how many submissions I’d sent out in 2018. (*lol*) And not knowing that number made me curious. So I reviewed my tracking sheet, did some math, and decided to blog about what I found, with some relevant tips to boot.

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