perugia press
perugia press is open to considering hybrid forms, including those incorporating visuals or created in collaboration .
susan kan, the founding director of perugia press, in the home office of rebecca olander, who is taking the reins of the women’s poetry press .
florence, ma: perugia press, 2004. isbn: 0 - 9660459 - 7 - 1 $ 15. 00
since 1997, perugia press has been publishing first and second books of poetry by women. we publish ...
perugia press, poetry prize, p. o. box 60364, florence, ma 01062. rebecca olander, director .
above, perugia press founding director susan kan, left, is turning the job over to rebecca olander, right, who has set up an office for the press in her florence home .
jendi reiter conducted this exclusive email interview with susan kan, editor of perugia press. ms. kan has an mfa in creative writing from warren wilson college. she directs perugia press from her home in florence, massachusetts. every year since 1997, perugia has published a new first or second book of poetry by an american woman. the average press run is 500 - 750 copies. this year for the first time, the press is sponsoring a poetry contest to find its featured author for the year. the perugia press intro award is accepting entries between august 1 and november 15, and offers a prize of $ 1, 000. visit perugia' s website to read sample poems from their past books and order copies .
perugia press began in 1997 as a publishing experiment with gail thomas’s beautiful poems about loss and survivorship. once the poems were collected and bound in finding the bear, press founder susan kan saw the powerful impact of making books .
before long, perugia press became a nonprofit organization with irs 501 (c) (3) tax exemption status, and launched a national competition for first or second books of poetry by women. now named the perugia press prize, the popular, annual contest is proving that excellence comes this way: one book at a time. in 2016, perugia press welcomed a new director, rebecca olander, who continues to build on the strong foundation established under susan kan’s direction .
a new small press out of iowa, maintenance ends, publishes its inaugural novel this november. it is, so to speak, the avant - garde wing of ice cube press .
susan kan smiles a bit ruefully as she recalls the early days at perugia press, when she would deliver poetry manuscripts she’d received to her volunteer readers — “screeners” — for an initial read .
and after heading the press since she began it in 1997, kan is transferring the reins to rebecca olander, a poet and editor who also teaches writing at westfield state university; she’s been involved with perugia in various capacities for about seven years, including serving on the press’ board of directors .
tell us a bit about perugia. what are your influences, your aesthetic, your mission ?
perugia press is a small and sturdy press. actually, we’re tiny. however, we get more than 500 submissions for each year’s perugia press prize. we charge $ 26 for the submission. that rate is based on the going rate, which makes sense. in the last 20 years, so much in printing has become electronic and streamlined, so the costs have gone down. i’m not complaining. sure, paper might be more expensive, say, but so many other time - related costs are down .
perugia press is a nonprofit poetry press publishing one collection of poetry each year, by a woman at the beginning of her publishing career. our mission is to produce beautiful books that interest long - time readers of poetry and welcome those new to poetry. we also aim to celebrate and promote poetry whenever we can .
as perugia says on its website, “excellence comes this way: one book at a time. ”
to do that, kan and olander said, perugia press incorporated as a nonprofit and decided to sponsor the annual competition to find new women poets who had not previously published a book, or had only published one .
q: tell me about the history of perugia press. when was it founded, and by whom? what was its raison d' être, or editorial philosophy? what is your own background in the poetry world ?
today, perugia press, like other publishers, relies on electronic submissions and other technological changes that have made the logistics of publishing easier. but one thing that hasn’t changed is the mission of the florence press: publishing the work of one new female poet each year, following a contest that can attract more than 500 applicants from across the country .
i began perugia press when i saw that many of the poets i knew had fantastic poetry manuscripts that they couldn’t get published. around the same time, a good friend of mine self - published a book about the umass basketball team. his book looked like a “real” book, and he encouraged me to make books. it’s funny that a sportswriter inspired this poetry press !
this month, perugia celebrates 20 years as a women’s press with a number of events — readings, workshops, a q & a session with poets, an anniversary party — at which several past winners of the annual contest will speak (see sidebar) .
q: perugia exclusively publishes poetry by women, and the contest is also for women only. why do you see the need for a women - only press, since women seem to be well - represented among famous contemporary poets and contributors to leading literary magazines ?
a prize of $ 1, 000 and publication by perugia press is given annually for a first or second poetry collection by a woman. submit a manuscript of 45 to 85 pages with a $ 27 entry fee by november 15. visit the website for complete guidelines .
end - of - year free book lottery! go to the perugia press website, choose a book, then send an email (via the website contact page) with your address and book choice by year' s end. five randomly chosen winners will be sent books. urltoken
when i made our first book—gail thomas’ finding the bear —i wasn’t really thinking i was starting a press. however, i loved the process so much that i published a second book and formally launched the press. this was in 1997 after i finished an mfa in creative writing at warren wilson .
how do you cope? there’s been a lot of conversation lately about charging reading fees, printing costs, rising book costs, who should pay for what, etc. do you have any opinions on this, and would you be willing to share any insights about the numbers at perugia press ?
and when confronted with the statistics about gender inequality in publishing, it’s clear we have work to do. some people believe the reason for discrepancies between men and women is that men are simply writing better books. at perugia press, we are convinced otherwise and are doing our part to tip the scales into balance .
corrie williamson, a montana poet who won the 2014 perugia press for “sweet husk, ” a collection of poems that celebrate the natural world in particular, said her book “has absolutely been a boon” to her writing, helping to open doors for more readings and panel appearances and for publishing additional poems in a range of journals .
a: in the past, the manuscripts have been read and screened by previous perugia press poets. this year, with the contest and increased advertising, i expect a lot more submissions, so the manuscripts will be screened and selected by a panel of poets, scholars, and poetry readers. previous perugia press poets are my most reliable readers, and i consider them both representatives of and partners in the press. part of my mission is to publish poetry that is enjoyable to a large readership, poetry that is not unnecessarily clever or referential, and that evades an unfortunate trend toward what mary jo salter once described to me as
willed obscurity .
that is why i like to have many readers and a cooperative selection process, rather than one final judge. i expect 20 - 25 manuscripts will make it to the final round .
in fact, kan and olander say they see perugia as a launching pad for female poets, and they point to a number of other awards their authors have won .
perugia press seeks to promote diversity and highlight marginalized and underrepresented voices in our publications, and to that end we encourage submissions written by poets of all abilities, ages, and sexual orientations, and from across all cultural, socio - economic, ethnic, racial, and religious backgrounds. we welcome submissions from across the globe, though they must be written in english .
the 2016 perugia press prize winner— guide to the exhibit by lisa allen ortiz—is the 20th book we’re publishing, marking our 20th anniversary! excellence comes best this way: one book at a time. i can spend a whole year with undivided attention on the project. and the one - book - at - a - time strategy has created a buzz: people want to know who will win the perugia press prize each year. we have resisted the pressure to expand, and that has paid off. our books keep winning national contests, including amanda auchter’s the wishing tomb which won the pen center usa award, and jennifer sweeney’s how to live on bread and music, which won the james laughlin award from the academy of american poets .
q: does perugia have a preference for narrative or straightforward free verse over more formal poetry (e. g. marilyn hacker) or experimental (e. g. jorie graham) ?
this was before the internet completely took off, and kan, perugia’s founder and longtime director, would have well over 400 paper copies of poetry collections to hand off to her 25 readers .
perugia’s goals have long been tightly focused — not just to publish a talented new woman poet each year but to advance interest in poetry in general. rather than trying to publish multiple titles, kan said, the press has sponsored its annual contest, with a $ 1, 000 prize, to find “the best new women poets out there” and work very closely with them to produce one well - designed book yearly .
independent presses are independent. that means we can do what we want, as long as we can afford it. i love that freedom. sometimes i can get stuck looking around at what other presses are doing and feel competitive, which is ridiculous and antithetical to poetry. so i strive to run the press in a way that works for me and all the people who help out with the press—the board of directors, screeners, judges, the poets themselves .
and amanda auchter, perugia’s 2012 winner for “the wishing tomb, ” won the 2013 pen center usa award — that recognition goes to writers living west of the mississippi river — for poetry for that same collection .
q: this is the first year that perugia is offering a manuscript contest. why did you decide to start a contest? is the contest in addition to your normal manuscript submission process, or a replacement for it ?
between that and the experience kan says she’s gained working as an editor for 20 years with perugia’s winners — “they’ve taught me so much, ” she said — it’s generally not hard to select the top submissions to each year’s contest .
financially, kan said, perugia has balanced its budget and turned a small profit over the years through entrance fees from its annual contest, book sales, donations and some grants — and olander says she sees no reason that pattern won’t continue .
diane gilliam fisher was born and raised in columbus, ohio. she received an individual artist fellowship from the ohio arts council in 2003, and kettle bottom received the 2004 intro award from perugia press, a poetry publisher based in florence, ma. her first book, one of everything, was published by the cleveland poets series in 2003. fisher holds a ph. d. in romance languages and literature from the ohio state university and an mfa from the warren wilson program for writers. she lives in brimfield, ohio .
a: yes, this is the inaugural year for the perugia press intro award. the decision to run a contest wasn' t easy. there are very few presses that still have an open submission policy, and that' s too bad, especially for the poets. presses run contests because without the entry fees, they couldn' t stay afloat, and that' s my reason as well. i am only able to publish one book each year, and for 2003, it will be the intro award winner .
a: perugia press was founded in 1997 when i was moved to publish finding the bear by gail thomas. her work and her struggle to publish inspired me to found the press and do my part to get unknown but very worthy voices into print. my mission is to publish women at the beginning of their publishing careers—first or second books only—giving each poet ample say in the making of her book. my background in poetry is largely self - taught, although i did study english in college and took some poetry classes in graduate school. since dr. seuss and a. a. milne, i' ve been drawn to rhythm and sounds in words. i have written some poetry myself, but i studied fiction writing in graduate school. i am struck by how often the highest praise for prose is that it' s
almost like poetry .
kan, who ran the press from her home (olander will now do it from hers), developed a group of volunteers to read submitted manuscripts and make recommendations for a selection of 16 semifinalists; that latter list is then whittled down to three finalists before kan, with recommendations from her volunteers, picks the winner .
for instance, nancy k. pearson, who won perugia’s 2008 prize for her collection “two minutes of light, ” has since received a number of awards, including a 2009 a pen / new england award for best collection of poetry; past pen / new england literary winners include andre dubus. tracy kidder, and mary oliver .
part of her motivation stemmed from the difficulty poets generally have in getting their work published — and the specific problems female poets and writers face. the perugia website includes statistics on the historical winners of major literary awards such as the pulitzer and nobel prizes, which all tilt heavily to men. in addition, the site says, 75 percent of american poet laureates have been men .
kan, who has a master’s degree in creative writing and has also written poetry, says she began the press as an experiment. a friend of hers, valley poet gail thomas, was having trouble finding a publisher. kan, a freelance copyeditor, decided she’d find a way to get thomas’ work into a book; she worked with thomas to fine - tune her poems, read up on publishing and layout and worked with printers and artists on a book design .
a: publicizing poetry books and authors is an ongoing challenge. i do the usual things: a large mailing announcing each book, both paper and electronic; i send out review copies, make as many contacts as i can in the publishing world, and set up readings. readings are the best way to hear the poetry and sell books. i have developed a nice working relationship with local booksellers and we often sponsor readings together, taking advantage of each others' mailing lists. i also expect the poet to promote her own book. perugia poets have had a wide variety of recognition. in 2000, writers digest did a nice article on their ten picks of
poets to watch ,
and almitra david was chosen. then, this past year, catherine anderson' s poem
womanhood
was selected by billy collins to be part of his poetry 180 high school program. he chose one poem for every day of the school year, to be read over the pa system each morning. gail thomas has published a second beautiful book called no simple wilderness: an elegy for swift river valley. it' s a good thing, since her first book, finding the bear, is sold out. janet aalfs has a new chapbook since publishing reach. and the press received a grant to sponsor a national poetry month reading series in 2003 .
q: i' ve been reading two of perugia' s recent titles, a wound on stone by faye george and the work of hands by catherine anderson, both of which were impressive. anderson reminds me of philip levine —her directness, her spare and unsentimental but somehow heroic depictions of working - class characters. her political poems are chillingly matter - of - fact pictures of oppression, similar to carolyn forche' s, as if to say that the ease with which atrocities become normal is what makes them so terrible. both authors make powerful use of understatement, letting anger or grief show through precisely in what they don' t say. george in particular has a clean, deceptively simple style, like someone who has cleared her mind after great suffering and is looking the future straight in the eye. i' d like to hear what you (or the editorial board) were thinking when you selected these works for publication. are they representative of the type of poetry you' re seeking ?
a: that women are well - represented is a misconception. for example, urltoken just published a study about the number of women published in the new yorker in the last year. the research shows that this year, only 24% of the writers for the magazine have been women. of those, most are staff writers. rarely are women writers represented in the high - profile feature articles at the beginning of the magazine. and some weeks, not a single woman appears in the whole magazine. and this is one of the most elite journals to publish poetry. furthermore, the july / august issue of poets and writers has a short piece addressing the issue of awards. according to their research, 22 out of 38 finalists for book awards were male. all but one of the winners and nominees for the 2002 pulitzer prizes in fiction and poetry are male. that' s not to say that women haven' t come a long way since emily dickinson. i like to think that most literary journals and presses do make a point to balance who they publish between men and woman. but, basically there' s plenty of room and need for a press that publishes only women. i tend to read more women poets, though not exclusively .
mary lee allen rebecca black michael collier margaret gibson catherine macdonald william olsen allison seay ron slate susan s. williams david wojahn
in night comes to the cumberlands harry caudill writes, “coal has always cursed the land in which it lies. ” the stories of the men who descend into the mines and the women and children who wait for them to emerge at the end of each shift are the subject of another remarkable volume, poet diane gilliam fisher’s second full - length collection, kettle bottom. set in 1920–21, a period of violent unrest known as the west virginia mine wars, the poems in kettle bottom combine compelling narratives with the charged, heightened language of lyric poetry. it is an unforgettable combination, one that characterizes the very best contemporary verse. in 2005 kettle bottom was selected by smith college as the summer reading selection for entering students, a singular honor for a volume of poetry .
kettle bottom consists of fifty - one poems divided into three sections, narrated by twenty different speakers. these speakers appear, disappear and reemerge throughout the loosely structured narrative, but their distinctive voices and precisely rendered perspectives are consistent and recognizable; there is no confusion for the reader as to who is the speaker in each poem. kettle bottom ’s human cast includes the miners and their families; the town’s schoolteacher, whose poems are in the form of journal entries; several black miners who are given the most dangerous jobs in the mine, and their families, who are segregated from the white community; men who are brought in as scabs during a strike; a family of italian immigrants who have been tricked into working and living in coal country; and even the mine owners. this world is compassionately and believably rendered by fisher, who does not flinch in the face of its historical and human complexity .
“explosion at winco no. 9, ” the book’s first poem, provides a kind of template for the poems that will follow. an account of the aftermath of a mine disaster, it is told in the voice of maude stanley, the young wife of a miner who has just died in the explosion. as the poem begins, she describes the ghastly business that is left to the women after the catastrophe: they must identify the bodies of their husbands, sons, and brothers. the speaker’s tone is flat but chilling as she describes the task :
it is true that it is the men that goes in, but it is us that carries the mine inside. it is us that listens to what they are scared of and takes the weight of it from them, like handing off a sack of meal. us that learns by heart how the teeth set crooked or straight. us that picks up the pieces .
fisher’s strategy—a series of linked monologues—is not without risks, especially given the dramatic stories and historically charged setting of kettle bottom. to her credit, fisher does not lapse into sentimentality nor does she make simple heroes of her narrators. instead she moves into a realm where story and poetry support one another to achieve genuine narrative momentum and emotional intensity .
i turned the quilt over on the bed when the neighbor women come in to cover the mirrors and stop the clocks, hang black crepe over the doorframe .
not a old feedsack quilt, but a wreath of hollyhocks, cut from aunt zelly’s pattern and done up from a piece of double pink mamma brought me from kermit, soft nile green for the leaves, and new bleached muslin to put it on. (from “pink hollyhocks” )
fisher’s poems deftly move between modest and largely feminine domestic space and the stunning but perilous landscapes of the mountain region and its coalmines .
the poems in kettle bottom brim with rich biblical allusions that are employed in surprising and effective ways. in “abe” the narrator is a miner’s wife who discovers that she is pregnant, and despite her misgivings about the impending strike and the uncertainty of the future, decides to have the child. in considering what she might name the baby, she says ,
henry is happy. he wants clairy, after his mama, if it’s a girl. i said, quick - like, if it’s a boy, abraham, for daddy—but call him abe. i don’t care for abraham. i would not want a name such as would fool a son up the mountain to his death. but i can go with abe—his secret, real name will be abednego. i want my boy such a name as talks back to kings and walks right out of a fiery furnace .
with its outright rejection of abraham’s unflinching obedience to god and its unexpected turn towards a little known old testament figure—abednego, who escapes from the “fiery furnace” of babylon—the poem tackles a familiar trope in a way that is fresh and moving. it is through gestures like this that fisher transcends the predictable pieties one might associate with this era and these speakers .
“raven light, ” the second section of kettle bottom, is a single, long poem composed of fifteen unnumbered sections. its narrator, nathan stokes, is a young miner trapped after the ceiling has collapsed in another part of the mine where he is working. the rubble of that collapse stands between him and escape, and he has begun to walk away from the disaster, moving in the opposite direction, deeper into the labyrinth of tunnels and caves that honeycomb the mountain. stanzas alternate between stream - of - consciousness descriptions of his desperation and the memories of his life before that day, including the story of his father’s death in a mining accident. an image of his father appears early in this dramatic monologue :
... then there he’d be, stomping coal dust off his boots on the porch, his face blacked and shiny, like it had soaked up the dark and give it back alive. he put me in mind of a raven, those times, and he was beautiful to my eyes .
the raven is a spirit, leading the speaker deeper and deeper into the mountain, which swallows whole the lives of its miners .
the twenty - five poems in the book’s third and final section, “winter—summer, ” detail the strike’s violent consequences and unsettling resolution and comprise the narrative climax of kettle bottom. unlike the wrenchingly personal stories of parts i and ii, the poems in part iii are often more overtly political. for example, “journal of katherine terry, ” who is the town’s schoolteacher, describes how an innocent gesture by a grieving wife sets in motion a protracted and violent strike :
the lost, they tell me, are almost never found, their bodies left adrift, comfortless in the unhallowed mountain like the sailors lost in the ocean’s deep sift. she did not speak, only turned the bucket upside - down—the miners’ way to signal a strike. henry burgess turned his, the gesture caught, swept through the crowd, and so it was decided—the men were going out .
this final section includes the poems most deeply informed by a formal historical narrative. it is indignant and spirited in its depiction of how badly the government and coalmine owners mistreated miners and their families. as the striking miners face down the federal government when it enters the dispute on behalf of the mine owners, the individual voices in each poem form a mosaic of sorrow, defiance, and individual resilience. yet, if there are miscalculations in this excellent book, they happen in this section .
in the poem “dear mr. president, ” the speaker addresses a distant and cruel politician, warren harding, who treats the miners’ strike as a revolt, sending in federal troops and planes loaded with poisonous gas to quell the strike. while this is historically accurate, the narrator’s defiant and astonished letter - poem does not resonate with the emotional acuity of the other poems in this section :
a lot of us down here has been to the war, and all of us has been in the mines. you can kill us, mr. president, we all know that. but what in the world makes you think you can scare us ?
still, one can understand fisher’s decision to write a poem that expresses the indignation and anger the miners must have felt during this period, for the struggles of the labor union movement in the twenties and thirties are well known. this is the difficulty of poetry that is so firmly rooted in narrative and history: can the poet tell what is objectively true using the highly compressed language and oblique strategies of poetry? in kettle bottom, fisher offers an original and compelling exploration of this question .
kettle bottom tells the stories of this embattled community with empathy and eloquence. its narrative coherence, robust language, and emotional integrity invite readers to savor it as both lyric and story; it bears up under repeated readings because of its strength on both of these fronts. this is poetry that offers the consolation of art and imagination to a history marred by violence and tragedy of epic proportion .
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fisher mines this dark chapter in american labor history, delving into the human condition by way of inhumane conditions. her pillars are the tools of her craft: authentic voices, well - researched vernacular, and moving, verisimilar details of daily life... .
are temporary load - bearing walls of coal in the
rooms
of mines. their removal presents a particular hazard, as one speaker tells us :
we come back in when the rooms is all mined and pull them down, we don’t leave nothing behind. i’ve knowed three men’s died that way, nothing left of them but their names— roof don’t hold too long without no walls. [ “sampson” ]
explores the west virginia mine wars of 1920 - 21. fisher mines this dark chapter in american labor history, delving into the human condition by way of inhumane conditions. her pillars are the tools of her craft: authentic voices, well - researched vernacular, and moving, verisimilar details of daily life in a place where “dark come earlier every day” [ “raven light” ] .
american popular culture has a certain fascination with coal mining. the pre - disco bee gees had a hit with “new york mining disaster 1941; ” post - “carrie” sissy spacek earned an oscar
; and the pennsylvania miners trapped for three days in 2002 were barely out of the shaft before they faced pitches from film producers competing to script their saga. perhaps our interest is primal, based on the universal fear of being buried alive, à la poe. or maybe coal mining is wrapped up in our collective guilt about having others do our dirty work for us. whatever the reason, there will be, i’m certain, a visceral interest in the content of fisher’s book .
at a certain point in a collection like this, however, creativity must take over where content leaves off. i’m happy to say that in this department, fisher strikes gold. there’s the widow who identifies her husband’s body from the calico patch she sewed on his shirt :
i didn’t have nothing to patch with but my old blue dress, and ted didn’t want floweredy goods on his shirt. i told him, it’s just under your arm, ted, it ain’t going to show. they brung out the bodies, you couldn’t tell. i seen a piece of my old blue dress on one of them bodies, blacked with smoke, but i could tell it was my patch, up under the arm. [ “explosion at winco no. 9” ]
it don’t do to think too much about it. the others is all going back in. first you got to eat, then you can think about thinking. [ “henry burgess decides to go back in” ]
robert davis’s father and two brothers are dead and nathan stokes is missing. when they told mrs. davis, she slid down on herself like melting wax on a candle then shook off the women who rushed to hold her. [ “journal of catherine terry, 5 december 1920” ] among others, there are children (“even our spelling words / is rock words, like ‘sediment’ and ‘petrified’” [ “pearlie tells what happened at school” ]); african - americans (“we all colored / down there in the dirt / and the dark” [ “good man in the mine” ]); and italian immigrants (“the english is rocky in the mouth, / so many hard sounds they batter the tongue like coal clattering from the tipple” [ “l’inglese” ]). even the company owner has his say, finding — much as fisher does throughout the collection — beauty in ugliness :
the coke ovens at night glow orange, like eyes opening on the hillside, like oracles, the founding of a hearth for a new world. [ “beautiful, the owner says” ] the most poignant poems are the “dear hazel” letters in which an older sister pens advice on everything from marriage (“some men, they get in the mine, and it gets them. they won’t do nothing else, nor care / anymore for what goes on in the sun. ”) to abortion (“as for the other thing / you ask, hazel, the answer is this: / three tablespoons of sugar and turpentine. ”). the centerpiece of the book is a 10 - page series of thoughts from a miner trapped by a “kettle bottom, ” a collapse that results when a several - hundred - pound petrified tree trunk drops through a mine’s roof. this poem, “raven light, ” marks one of the few moments in the book in which fisher falters. the speaker is facing certain death, but his thought process — while full of rich images — feels too organized, too ordered. a true stream - of - consciousness poem would have been harder to follow but more interesting. there are other instances in which parts of poems, particularly endings, seem a little forced. in “sheepskin, ” for example, the speaker talks back to a doctor :
what i know is not wrote on sheepskin, doctor, i told him. i said, what i know is wrote on the wall. it’s a strong ending — maybe too strong. more likely this woman — like most of us — would think of the perfect retort well after she’d left the doctor’s office. i’d find it more credible — and more in keeping with her sense of powerlessness — if the woman had wished, as an afterthought, that she’d spoken these words. another poem, “violet’s wash, ” ends with :
the angel metaphor, lovely as it is, seems a bit too poetic for a miner’s wife. this ending also presents another problem: how is it that our speaker knows, for instance, to hyphenate “burnt - looking” but doesn’t know that “would of” should be “would have”? if the answer is that she’s speaking, not writing, perhaps this woman is proof that aspiring poets should all go to mining towns instead of m. f. a. programs. the lines, like a few others in the collection, are too elegant by a half, pointing to the dilemma inherent in writing persona poems (especially those that include, as this book does, “mountain” words like “painter” for “bobcat” and “sang” for “ginseng”). it’s hard to know what’s enough and what’s too much .
these are minor criticisms. fisher wanted poems that resonate, and let’s face it, most people don’t think in symbols and similes. a few of the folks in
needed fisher’s help, and, in most cases, the poems are better for it .
bosses begin to edge back toward the hall. i stood in their way. with my right hand i pressed one pillar, the other with my left. i explained—to the mountain we all the same. in this, her second full - length collection, fisher forces her readers to confront the painful realities of poverty, discrimination, brutality, and death. if we try to run, she is there like the angry miner, blocking our way with another poem, another haunting story. our kettle bottom may be an imaginary one, but we are wide - eyed, stricken, and breathless, nonetheless. .
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poets must have no more than one previously published full - length book. you are still eligible if you have published a poetry chapbook / s or books in other genres. you are still eligible if you have published more than one full - length poetry collection in a language other than english .
poets must be women, which is inclusive of transgender women and female - identified individuals. because gender inequality still occurs in publishing, we consider it part of our explicit feminist mission to support and promote women’s voices in print .
individual poems may have been published previously in magazines, journals, anthologies, and chapbooks, but the collection as a whole must be unpublished .
translations of the work of others and previously self - published books are not eligible .
manuscripts are generally between 45 and 85 pages. please submit manuscripts that fall within or close to this page count. use legible typeface, and include page numbers on each page and in the table of contents. no more than one poem per page .
a non - refundable entry fee of $ 27 must accompany each submission. you may submit more than one manuscript; each is considered separately and must include a separate entry fee .
manuscripts must be submitted between august 1 and november 15. winner is announced by april 1 .
to be certain that manuscripts receive the fairest consideration, all manuscripts are submitted to the judging panel anonymously. take care to follow instructions so that we can remove your name .
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cover letter and bio may be added in the “comments” section, but are not required. publications acknowledgments may be included in “comments” also, but should be excluded from the manuscript itself .
make your payment of $ 27 using your credit card at our secure site .
attach two cover pages: one with title of manuscript, name, address, telephone number, and email address, and one with title of manuscript only .
cover letter and bio not required. publications acknowledgments may be included in cover letter, but should be excluded from the manuscript itself .
manuscripts will be recycled at the end of the contest, so do not send your only copy .
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 :
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 .
lynne thompson reading at beyond baroque – rescheduled for sept. – stay tuned for details
how to live on bread and music, by jennifer k. sweeney won the james laughlin award from the academy of american poets .
two minutes of light, by nancy k. pearson won the l. l. winship / pen new england award .
begin empty - handed, by gail martin won the housatonic book award from western connecticut state university .
beg no pardon, by lynne thompson won the great lakes colleges association new writers award .
kettle bottom, by diane gilliam fisher won the thomas and lillie d. chaffin award for appalachian writing .
we produce beautiful books, lovely to hold, to look at, as well as to read. our goal is to reach as large an audience as possible, selecting poetry that is welcoming to new readers as well as interesting to longtime readers .
submission manager is currently in “no submissions” mode. submitters and staff may log into their accounts however no new submissions are being accepted at this time .
will be participating once again in the poetry circus, july 21 ...
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perugia press is an american not-for-profit poetry press located in florence , massachusetts and founded in 1997 by editor and director susan kan . the press publishes one collection of poetry each year , by a woman poet chosen from its annual book contest , the perugia press prize . notable authors published by perugia press include diane gilliam fisher ( kettle bottom , 2004 ) , melanie braverman , frannie lindsay , jennifer k. sweeney , lynne thompson , and nancy k. pearson . authors have been recipients many awards including the james laughlin award , the l. l. winship/pen new england award , the great lakes colleges association new writers award , the ohioana library association poetry book of the year award , the pushcart prize , nea literature fellowships , massachusetts cultural council grants , and numerous other honors . perugia press titles have been reviewed by valparisio poetry review , prairie schooner , blackbird , and other publications . 
perugia press is an americannot-for-profit poetry press located in florence, massachusetts and founded in 1997 by editor and director susan kan. the press publishes one collection of poetry each year, by a woman poet chosen from its annual book contest, the perugia press prize. notable authors published by perugia press include diane gilliam fisher (kettle bottom, 2004), melanie braverman, frannie lindsay, jennifer k. sweeney, lynne thompson, and nancy k. pearson. authors have been recipients many awards including the james laughlin award, the l. l. winship/pen new england award, the great lakes colleges association new writers award, the ohioana library association poetry book of the year award, the pushcart prize, nea literature fellowships, massachusetts cultural council grants, and numerous other honors. perugia press titles have been reviewed by valparisio poetry review, prairie schooner, blackbird, and other publications.
perugia press is an americannot-for-profit poetry press located in florence, massachusetts and founded in 1997 by editor and director susan kan. the press publishes one collection of poetry each year, by a woman poet chosen from its annual book contest, the perugia press prize. notable authors published by perugia press include diane gilliam fisher (kettle bottom, 2004), melanie braverman, frannie lindsay, jennifer k. sweeney, lynne thompson, and nancy k. pearson. authors have been recipients many awards including the james laughlin award, the l. l. winship/pen new england award, the great lakes colleges association new writers award, the ohioana library association poetry book of the year award, the pushcart prize, nea literature fellowships, massachusetts cultural council grants, and numerous other honors. perugia press titles have been reviewed by valparisio poetry review, prairie schooner, blackbird, and other publications.