Category: Poetry Prize

The Briefly Write Poetry Prize is back… and bigger than ever before!

An annual poetry competition that celebrates and rewards bold, succinct writing, the Briefly Write Poetry Prize 2025 is the fifth instalment of this popular free-to-enter writing competition.

See the competition guidelines and enter here.

We are looking for well-crafted poems up to 10 lines, with innovative language, strong imagery and a subtle, focused composition.

Our biggest prize pot ever

This year, the minimum prize fund in the Briefly Write Poetry Prize is £80, divided as follows:

FIRST = £40 / SECOND = £25 / THIRD = £15. All shortlisted poets will also be paid.

We are committed to accessibility and, as such, entry is free for everyone. If you can, we would appreciate any support to help us meet the costs and boost the prize fund.

Read all of 2024’s winning and commended poems here.

Eileen Anderson

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In the liminal space between the stunted Oak and the wild North Sea is Marram.
Sharp edged grass. Slice your fingers grass. Don’t try clutching it grass.
Root weaver. Sand binder. Dune stabiliser.
Sun-bleached, bone-white skull hider.
Breeze trapper. Foot tripper.
Dagger leaves pointing skywards, seeking the sun.
Roots
always travelling, east and west, north and south.
Each year inching their way out along the coast.

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After a first career involving scientific writing, and a second writing people policies, Eileen Anderson now delights in creative writing. The natural world is a constant inspiration, and she is currently completing a collection of Badger stories alongside her poetry.

Debmalya Bandyopadhyay

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Absence sleeps between the waves.
My father at the pier alone, picks up
the language of endless arrival, lends his
shirt to the wind’s wailing wardrobe.
Take this, and this, and this too.

Somewhere in him, the trees are still bending
to you humming Edelweiss. Through them,
a forlorn road finds the pier. My father –
your softest lover walks there all night,
and comes back shirtless each morning.

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Debmalya Bandyopadhyay (he/him) is a writer and mathematician based in Birmingham, UK. He was a finalist for Sweet Literary’s 2024 Poetry Award and Sophon Lit’s 2024 Poetry Contest. He is often in parks confabulating with local birds and bees.

Ian Farnes

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The clearing at the town’s edge
is a network of stillness muted by snowfall.

Two crows bolt black from the blank
flat skies and shift a hawk out, over

slate roofs, uphill to the miner’s village,
where we left the lines of rabbits’ skulls
along the broken wall.

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Ian Farnes grew up in Burntisland, Fife but now lives and works as a translator and writer in Barcelona. His debut poetry pamphlet is due to be published in February 2025. More details can be found on his website.

Nazaret Ranea

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My grandfather, at eighty years old,
climbs up the olive tree
without looking down.

From up there, his bald head shines.
He’s getting old.

The curly hair covering his chest
was once his shield in the war.
Now, back home, under this sun,
it looks like a layer of foam.

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Nazaret Ranea is one of Scotland’s Next Generation Young Makars. Her poetry explores themes of nostalgia, memory, and home. Her work has appeared in over 50 publications internationally. You can find out more about her work here.

Prosper C. Ìféányí

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There is a quest
         –tion about the numb

         –er of times
         our count
         –ry feeds us bull
         –ets and we

         –eds, and we can
         –not remember how to be
         –cause the over

–fed has sold his tongue.

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Prosper C. Ìféányí writes from Lagos, Nigeria. His works are featured or forthcoming in Black Warrior Review, Transition, Magma Poetry, Denver Quarterly, Poetry Wales, and elsewhere.

Isabella Waldron

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white walls, white walls
i want to rub my hands in ash
watch them whisper on the white walls

i begin to hate my pink Mary-Janes
tongueless, they gape at me
grotesque against beige carpet, white walls

my father asks what i want to do
the weekend is ours, but it is all white walls

i tell him i need new shoes
so that he will matter again

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Isabella Waldron is an American-British writer. Her play how to build a wax figure (Assembly/November Theatre) premiered at Edinburgh Fringe to critical acclaim. Plays Jawbone, Things I Never Told The Stars and Chatter were selected as semi-finalists for the O’Neill National Playwrights Conference and Bay Area Playwrights’ Festival. Her poetry has been featured in Chewboy and won the Ruth George Poetry Award.

Jesse Domenech

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It was the year we ran out
of lilies. There was so much loss
that funeral wreaths
were made of plastic bulbs.

That’s all that was left.
All the other flowers
had been pulled
and offered to the dead.

And the new lilies
had yet to bloom.

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Jesse Domenech (1985-2023) was a Cuban-American poet and songwriter from Queens, NY, who championed compassion and generosity, often through humor, on the page and in life. He was a student of Billy Collins’ Poetic Hydraulics workshop and drew inspiration from hip-hop, standup comedy, and life’s curiosities. Although Jesse was a prolific author, his work had never before been published. He was a beloved friend to many.

The prize money has been donated to the Holy Apostles Soup Kitchen in Manhattan in Jesse’s memory.

…crawling, open-clawed, | in another country…

The Briefly Write Poetry Prize is here, there and everywhere.

Everyone, whoever you are and wherever you are in the world, is invited to submit one short poem. This year, we received 1,315 unique entries. From elephants to elegies, heartache to haircuts, we were dazzled by the diversity and quality of themes, styles and ideas. We are grateful to have had the chance to read such a diverse array of short poetry. Inevitably, with so many outstanding short poems to consider, we had to pass on hundreds that we would have loved to acknowledge.

Then, there is a period of several months in which we read, read, re-read every poem (anonymously) and put together a longlist that is full of incredible words and images and ideas and we think how are we ever going to whittle this down to one winner, one runner-up and a handful of shortlisters? So, we take a break, breathe, let the poems rest. Weeks pass. Seasons change.

We dive back in when we feel the urge and can’t wait any longer. We re-read the longlist and fall in love with our favourites all over again. Here, we get a feeling for which poems feel as fresh, as brilliant, as ferociously urgent as they did when we first read them two months earlier.

At the end of this process, we’re excited to share our selection of the best short poetry for 2024. In our fourth year, the disclaimer we wrote for our inaugural competition is still as pertinent:

We hope you’ll agree with all our choices… but acknowledge you probably won’t. Personal taste is a wonderful thing. And poetry is a conversation. We would love to hear what you think – reflections on the poems, discussion of themes or styles, congratulations to the winning poets – in the comments below.

Thank you to everyone who shared their words, stories and little parts of themselves. Thank you to everyone who supported the competition. And thank you for taking the time to read new writing (however you came across this page). The Briefly Write Poetry Prize will be back in 2025. As ever, it will be FREE to enter and FREE to read.

Here are our choices for 2024.

Daniel & Elinor

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FIRST

Christine C. Rivero-Guisinga, ‘Everywhere, the Body’

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SECOND

Jesse Domenech, ‘It Was The Year’

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THIRD

Isabella Waldron, ‘my father’s first apartment‘

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SHORTLIST

Prosper C. Ìféányí, ‘The Nigerian Nightmare’

Nazaret Ranea, ‘Field’

Ian Farnes, ‘Local Wildness’

Debmalya Bandyopadhyay, ‘After the drowning’

Eileen Anderson, ‘Marram’

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LONGLIST

Zoe Davis * Skye Robinson * Jacqueline Jules * Jeff Skinner * Luke Hankins * Claire Lynn * Otuaga Maria Ogheneruno * Creana Bosac * John Jeffire * Atar Hadari * Okafor Michael * Jowonder Woodward * Francesca La Nave * Gloria Sanders * Elena Zhang * Abigail Flint * Deborah Finding * Florence Grieve * Em Prendergast * Laure Sahuguet * Fatimah Bustani * Helen Ferris *

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Read more:

• Briefly Write Poetry Prize 2023 – Results
• Briefly Write Poetry Prize 2022 – Results
• Briefly Write Poetry Prize 2021 – Results