Our Janet B. McCabe Poetry Prize is closed.
Each year we award $1500 and publication in Ruminate to the winning poet.
Sign up for our emails, and we'll send you updates and deadline reminders:
Two poems per entry;
40 lines or less
Entry fee is $20
(includes
a digital copy of Ruminate)
Deadline is February 1st
(with a 3-day grace period)
As with all our submissions, we highly recommend reading a copy of the magazine to better understand the type of work we are looking for.
Download a free excerpt from a past issue featuring some of the winning poems from our 2013 Poetry Prize judged by Maurice Manning.
Want to read a full issue?
Purchase issues featuring past Poetry Prize recipients here:
Purchase issues featuring past Poetry Prize recipients here:
"I can’t speak for all writers, but I do think I am not alone in wanting, more than anything, to be read. Read with intention. Read with appreciation. Read with pleasure. Read more than once by the same person. I will always strive for this. And no singular accomplishment has impacted this more than winning the Janet B. McCabe Prize."
—Maggie Blake Bailey, winner of Ruminate's 2017 Janet B. McCabe Poetry Prize. Her poem, "Elizabeth Asks" appears in Issue 45: Unfinished.