2025 Contest Winners

July 1st – December 31st

1st Place Winner

Valenae Laster / Milwaukee, WI
Midnight Manor

Beneath the moon’s pale, trembling glance,
The manor waits in shadowed trance,
Where ivy clings to ruined stone
And midnight winds sing all alone.
Through haunted halls and velvet gloom,
Your silhouette drifts from room to room.
A whisper lingers in the air—
A secret promise, dark and rare.
 
The candelabras flicker gold
On portraits faded, faces cold;
Yet in your eyes a fever gleams,
A longing born of midnight dreams.
My heart, a captive in your keep,
Trembles awake from ancient sleep;
You call me forth with silent art,
And carve your name upon my heart.
 
Outside, the storm claws at the glass;
Within, our shadows twist and pass.
I taste your sigh upon my skin—
A love forbidden, grave as sin.
The clock tolls twelve, the echoes swell—
We dance between this world and hell.
Enchanted, doomed, we intertwine:
Your soul is dark, and yet—it’s mine.

2nd Place Winners


Julie Barbour / Chandler, AZ
The Recycled Story

James Braddy / Thomaston, GA
A Peculiar Little Bird

Bratati Chakraborty / Simpsonville, SC
Dhokar Dalna

Julia Crews / Denver, CO
Calico

Jocelynn Crofoot / Waterford, PA
The Final Courtship

Mercedes Diehl / Indiana, PA
You Tried Dippy Eggs for the First Time

Jaydoni Dominguez / Chicago, IL
A Pensive Poet

Wilson Engel / Beachwood, OH
Ninety-One Steps

Douglas Gosselin / Cedar Hill, TX
A Legacy in Bone and Breath

Mercedes Heaton / Jeannette, PA
A Monument to Habit

Evelyn Jones / Baltimore, MD
My Ribs Remember the Honey

Ashley Kincer / Green Sea, SC
Fire Was the Only Language Left

Victoria Kowalczyk / Decatur, GA
Lines, Tubes, & Drains

Kailee McNall / Pendleton, OR
Fawn

Angelica Mendoza Polanco / St. Albans, NY
Generational

Brenda Mox / Virginia Beach, VA
Ode to St. Vincent Milay

Chloe Parekh / Brooklyn, NY
Sweet Secret

Pratiksha Sathish Kumar / Cumming, GA
Flowers and the Sun

Brittneysue Villa / Miami, FL
Unscripted Paris

William Zettler / Gurnee, IL
A Smoky Bar

3rd Place Winners

Joel Belland / Kiel, WI
She Passes Through My Life

Dessa Beneth / Lovell, WY
Emotional Possession

Bobby Bonnett / Poca, WV
Nights of Noir

Betsy Boyer / Winthrop, WA
Blue Boards

Neela Bullock / Chandler, AZ
Only One Utterance Wanted for a Once Man

Craig Burgess / Collingswood, NJ
A Poet, His Poems, and His Readers

Kristina Casubolo / Norwalk, CT
Self-portrait, Age Twenty-four

Leslye Deleon / San Rafael, CA
Julia

Anthony Duran / New York, NY
Firmament’s Throne

Lisa Gabrielson / Bristolville, OH
Grow

Lillian Gardner / Tigard, OR
Sham of My Feelings

Evan Griffin / Redondo Beach, CA
Yesterday

Tyler Harwood / Carver, MA
Fetid Ambrosia

Jim Healey / Aptos, CA
Owed to the Conference

Diane Henn / Dennis Port, MA
Oma’s Attic

David Huff / Auburndale, FL
New Deputy on Patrol

Juan Jaramillo / Henderson, NV
Stealthy

Chloe Khang / Palmetto, FL
Proud

Geum Kim / Germantown, MD
A Space with Stories

Kindall Kirby / Pearland, TX
Between Shadows and Light

Cassandra Koch / Lake Oswego, OR
The Stolen Diary

Hannah Lee / Guthrie, OK
The Abstract Picture

Dorthy McCarthy / Blair, OK
Looking at My Brother’s Photograph

Aliveah McElroy / Spencer, MA
The Who

Henry Mende / New City, NY
On the Resonances of Discontent		Max Micallef / Schenectady, NY
The Smoke Does Not Rise

Patricia Miller / Warren, OH
Jury Pool

Jonathan Mollenkof / Celeste, TX
Love in the Dark

Melinda Montilla / Canton, MI
Borders and Dreamers

Mira Mukerji / Half Moon Bay, CA
Change with the Days

Emma Parry / New York, NY
Sediment

Serina Perez / Downey, CA
Tea

Laura Popovici / Goodyear, AZ
Sorrow Comes in Sleep

Alexis Quintanill / Jersey Village, TX
Rib Cage Tree

Robert Reed / Canton, MI
A Ghost in Diagnosis

William Rosana / Tinley Park, IL
Galena

Judy Russell / Sugarloaf, CA
Good Old Days

Jeannie Simpson / Greenville, SC
When I Was Five Years Old

Jerry Snyder / Murphysboro, IL
Stone’s Silent Vigil

Sagel Springs / Myrtle Beach, SC
Orchid Within

Clara Stern / Irvington, NY
Make Me a Book

Alexis Tagui / Panama City, FL
Jeepney with Adoring Shower

Sara Teller / Novi, MI
Chancing the Crossroads

Serafima Tucker / Anthem, AZ
Poet’s Guffaw

Mike Wahl / Athens, AL
Turncoat

Austin Ward / Mineral Ridge, OH
Blue Notes

Anne Whitehouse / New York, NY
The Potters of Burkina Faso

Amanda Wilson / Daytona Beach, FL
Pneuma

Emma Xu / Los Gatos, CA
Demeter’s Despair

Veronica Zieba / Birmingham, AL
Outcome of Time