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Of Mayes’s poem Nikky Finney writes, “This incredible poem sees into its focal moment with the greatest of clarity, attention to detail, and astonishing matrilineal love. The architect of these words is rich in their understanding of the precious moment they have dipped the reader into. Their deep desire to build a worthy and creative vessel for our travel is levitational. A Golden Glosa takes us there. The memory of the beautician-mother teaching the poet-daughter is the engine, Tretheway’s epigraph is the oil running through the metal/mettle of memory, but the poet composes the journey with an incredible veracity of memorable verbs and a keen understanding of the power of an opening line that whispers all the way through and ultimately suspends us in the air, most especially just before they hurl us into the magnolia “Blue Magic” aroma of this simile:

She taught me the art of/ the silk press, the stiletto nail, to blow on wig glue, /
like my mouth was trying to drive/ the buffalo from the great plains.

It is a woman’s poem, a daughter’s poem, a poem of seeking and permission that I
believe Adrienne Rich would hold in her glorious poetic hands and wave in the air while continuing to insist that all is not lost between us."

We’re grateful to the Adrienne Rich Literary Trust and to all who submitted poems for this year’s contest.

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Pamela Alexander's chapbook, "Left," is now available! Visit our shop today to get your hands on a copy of this winner of the 2024 Chad Walsh Chapbook Prize. Kevin Prufer writes of this collection, “In terse lyric poetry, Alexander creates characters that seem alive in their contradictions. Like a memoir distilled into poetry, this book is alive, frightening, and humane, suggesting, always, how little we might know of each other’s inner lives. This is one of the best poetry collections I have read in years.” We know you'll love this fierce elegy. Order a copy today.

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Of Sweeney’s poem, Marilyn Chin writes, "I love this tiara of sonnets, filled with lurid confessions and womanist high jinks. I am especially impressed by the sprinklings of brilliant assertions: 'Gender is undistinguishable from gender…' 'You were immune, an error of blood at birth, small and pale, and boned.' Perhaps this sequence was inspired by Adrienne Rich’s 'Twenty-One Love Poems,' perhaps not. Nonetheless, I believe that Adrienne Rich would’ve enjoyed reading this edgy collection.”

We’re grateful to the Adrienne Rich Literary Trust and to all who submitted poems for this year’s contest.

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The editors of the Beloit Poetry Journal are delighted to announce that they have selected Pamela Alexander's Left for this year's title in the Chad Walsh Chapbook Series.

Pamela Alexander is the author of four previous collections of poetry, including Slow Fire. Other books were awarded the Yale Younger Poet and Iowa Poetry Prizes, and her work has appeared in many periodicals and anthologies. She taught creative writing at MIT and Oberlin College for many years, and served on the editorial board of FIELD magazine. Her honors include fellowships at the Fine Arts Work Center and at the Harvard-Radcliffe Institute. She lives in Maine.

When you subscribe to the BPJ, you’ll receive as part of your subscription a copy of the forthcoming chapbook in the series. Not a subscriber? Subscribe here.

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Of alexandra's poem, Marie Howe writes, "I kept coming back to this poem—which looks deceptively simple: folding sheets at the communal laundry line.  But what it holds is so much: one and many, what is and what might be, you and me, head and heart, garden and the appearance of garden, the present and the future—all bundled into the now of folding, matching one frowning corner of a sheet to another.  Form and Matter indeed. And I felt addressed as a reader, folded in, included in this poet's philosophical reverie, and I felt joy."

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We’re grateful to the Adrienne Rich Literary Trust and to all who submitted poems for this year’s contest.

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