Tammis Day Poetry Prize
Thanks to an extremely generous gift from the Tammis Day Foundation, Nine Syllables Press will soon be accepting submissions for the Tammis Day Poetry Prize, which will be awarded for a debut full-length collection by a woman poet over the age of forty. (Cis women, and trans and nonbinary poets of all genders are eligible to submit, full guidelines below.)
No such literary prize yet exists in the US, and it’s especially moving and gratifying to name this award after Tammis Day, a Smith College student who developed a love of poetry as an Ada Comstock Scholar under the mentorship of Annie Boutelle, the founder of The Poetry Center. During her time at Smith, Tammis herself was a founding editor of the campus literary journal Labrys, and it’s wonderful to know that her legacy will continue to create new space for the voices of historically excluded writers, as well as robust professional practice opportunities for Smith College students. Moreover, in alignment with Tammis’ passionate work as a patron of the arts, each recipient of the prize will also be awarded a two-week artist residency at the Vermont Studio Center.
The first Tammis Day Poetry Prize will be selected by Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Diane Seuss, and the inaugural collection will be published in the Fall of 2027, when we will be celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of the Poetry Center.
Please join our mailing list or follow us on Instagram to receive updates about this contest. Submissions will be open March 2026-August 2026.
Who can submit?
Trans and nonbinary poets over 40 years of age of all genders, and cis women poets can submit their chapbook to the Tammis Day Poetry Prize. You must be over 40 at the time of submitting your work. We especially encourage trans/LGBTQIA+ poets and BIPOC poets to submit their work. Poets cannot have previously published full-length collections of poetry (48 pages or longer), but can have published chapbooks. Individual poems from the collection may have been published elsewhere. Poets outside the US are also welcome to submit.
9SP complies with the CLMP Code of Ethics in the administration of this contest. The judge will select a manuscript in an anonymous review process and will not award the prize to any writer whose personal relationship to the judge poses a conflict of interest. Current students, staff, and faculty at Smith College are not eligible to submit, and those with a personal relationship with the final judge are not eligible to submit.
Simultaneous submissions are allowed, please withdraw your work if it is accepted elsewhere.
What to submit?
Send us an original, unpublished poetry collection of 48-100 pages. Please note, we are not able to consider collections which include images such as photographs, collage, or other visual media.
How to format it?
Do NOT include your name, acknowledgements, or any identifying details (address, social media handles, etc) anywhere in your manuscript. If your name appears in a poem, such as a ghazal, please redact it with a [ ].
Please use a standard typeface such as Times New Roman or Garamond, size 12.
Include a table of contents at the beginning. This does not count towards your page count.
Please include page numbers on all pages.
Please note, we are not able to consider collections which include images such as photographs, collage, or other visual media.
AI generated work policy:
We do not accept manuscripts which have been generated using AI (ChatGPT or similar software). Do not submit AI-generated work.
What if my manuscript is 46 pages long? Or 110?
48-100 pages is a guideline, and considered standard length for a full length poetry book. We will consider manuscripts close to 48-100 pages, a few pages more or less will not disqualify you. If your manuscript is significantly less than 48, please submit to our chapbook contest instead.
Who reads the manuscripts?
Students at Smith College who are enrolled in the courses The Chapbook in Practice: Design and/or The Chapbook in Practice: Submissions & Publishing are involved in Nine Syllables Press, participate in reading submissions anonymously, learning how to design the interior and exterior of chapbooks, and creating marketing for our books. The final selections from the students are passed on to the final judge, who chooses the winner.
We are very excited about this opportunity for students to engage in the hands-on experience of running a small press.
receive updates about this contest.