Submissions are open now for the 2023 Barry Spacks Poetry Prize. The editors are thrilled that Gary Soto will be our final judge this year. The Spacks Prize is awarded to a full-length manuscripts and includes publication, $1000, and 50 copies of the winning book. Read more here.
Anacapa Review now accepting submissions
The editors of Gunpowder Press are happy to announce a new online poetry journal, Anacapa Review. Anacapa Review will be published monthly, with the first issue appearing March 2023. We welcome submissions of poems, as well as proposals for reviews or poetry-related prose. Visit the Anacapa Review site for more.
Cheers to Madeline Miller, Santa Barbara’s First Youth Poet Laureate
Gunpowder Press welcomes Santa Barbara’s first Youth Poet Laureate, Madeline Miller! We are honored to present her poem below. america in june america, i love youwith no stars in my eyeslove like each cell of my own bodydying out of duty, letting me live. love like a mothercleaning the feces off her infant childboth of […]
Final Days to Enter
The Barry Spacks Poetry Prize includes publication, $1000, and 50 copies of your book. We are thrilled to announce Danusha Lamerís as our final judge for 2022! Read more here.
April is National Poetry Month
In celebration, Gunpowder Press is posting a poem a day to our Facebook and Instagram pages. Thank you, poets!
What Breathes Us: 3 Santa Barbara Poets Laureate to tour Ireland
Gunpowder Press is the media sponsor for an upcoming trip inspired by a visit to Dick Mack’s Pub in Dingle (Santa Barbara’s sister city in Ireland) by former mayor Helene Schneider. Organized by publisher David Starkey, the resulting tour will include seven stops in Ireland and North Ireland. Read more and the full itinerary here.
7 Reasons to enter your book for the Spacks Prize
We understand there are a LOT of poetry book contests out there and Gunpowder Press is a young press (founded in 2014). This is our 4th year hosting the Barry Spacks Poetry Prize. We are very proud of what we’ve accomplished with our poets so far, so here are a few reasons to submit your work […]
What Gunpowder Poets Are Reading
We asked Kurt Olsson, winner of the 2016 Spacks Prize for his book Burning Down Disneyland, what books he’s enjoying now: Garden Time, W.S. Merwin (Copper Canyon Press)—the poems tend to strike the same chord, but what a wonderful chord. You Never Know, Ron Padgett (Coffee House Press)—Padgett does what he does as effortlessly as […]
2016 Spacks Prize Now Open!
We are thrilled that poet Thomas Lux has agreed to be the final judge for the 2016 Barry Spacks Poetry Prize. Gunpowder Press received 100 submissions for the 2015 prize and was very happy to release the winning book, Catherine Abbey Hodges’ Instead of Sadness (selected by Dan Gerber), in December 2015. Submissions are being […]
Original Face: Poems by Jim Peterson available soon!
Original Face, a new collection by Jim Peterson, will be officially released by Gunpowder Press on October 1. Order online and get your copy as soon as they’re available. Fred Chappell calls the book “one of the most original collections I know of. Not because of poetic turns, striking images, sudden insights and so on […]
Shoreline Voices Project
Through the Shoreline Voices Project, Gunpowder Press publishes theme collections by Santa Barbara and area poets. The first book in the series, Buzz: Poet Respond to SWARM, is a collaborative effort of Gunpowder, Ganna Walska Lotusland, and the poets.
