November 2026 is the season's big book-prize month for poets. Yale, BOA, Georgia, Nightboat, Fordham's Poetic Justice prizes and Beloit's Chad Walsh chapbook all close, plus a handful of single-poem contests, broadsides and paying journal calls. Below is a curated roundup of poetry contests November 2026 and related calls we verified on official contest or publisher pages. … [Read more...] about Poetry Submission Deadlines November 2026
Daffodil, By: Paul White
I cannot know what course you’ll take Nor promise what that path will bring But know your will and proud resolve Stand tall; The daffodil in spring Though bitter storms may rake the sky And fears like thorns may pierce your view Defy the frost, refuse to bow; The spring was always meant for you Force through the earth where winter slept Break ground, bring life, rejoice, … [Read more...] about Daffodil, By: Paul White
What Is a Catalogue Poem? (Catalog Poetry Explained)
A catalogue poem, or catalog poem, is a poem built from a list: names, objects, people, places or actions, piled up line after line, usually in a repeated pattern. In catalogue poetry the list is the poem's engine. Each new item adds weight until the whole says something no single line could. The best place to see catalog poetry at work is Walt Whitman: read I Hear America … [Read more...] about What Is a Catalogue Poem? (Catalog Poetry Explained)
When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer Summary and Analysis
This When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer summary begins in a lecture hall. In Walt Whitman's short poem, the speaker listens to a famous astronomer explain the stars with proofs, figures, charts and diagrams. The audience applauds, but the speaker grows tired and sick. He slips outside alone into the night air and looks up at the stars "in perfect silence." The poem sets … [Read more...] about When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer Summary and Analysis
A Poison Tree Summary and Analysis
This A Poison Tree summary starts with a simple lesson about anger. In William Blake's poem, the speaker tells his friend that he is angry, and the anger ends. He hides his anger from his enemy, and it grows. He feeds it with fears, tears, false smiles and tricks until it becomes a tree bearing a shining apple. His enemy steals the apple at night, and in the morning the speaker … [Read more...] about A Poison Tree Summary and Analysis
The Heritage, By: Rudyard Kipling
Our Fathers in a wondrous age,Ere yet the earth was small,Ensured to us an heritage,And doubted not at allThat we, the children of their heart,Which then did beat so high,In later time should play like partFor our posterity. A thousand years they steadfast built,To 'vantage us and ours,The Walls that were a world's despair,The sea-constraining Towers:Yet in their midmost … [Read more...] about The Heritage, By: Rudyard Kipling