A while ago I went away by myself for a weekend to work up a couple of poetry manuscripts for some prizes, one of which was the Whitmore Press Manuscript Prize.
I was pretty happy with what I walked away with after that weekend, and also pretty stoked to find out a couple weeks back that I’d been chosen as one of the 12 shortlisted poets for the prize. It was a nice affirmation and an indication that I might not be the only person who’s interested in poems featuring Robocop and Richard Nixon.
Sadly I didn’t make it as the final choice of the Whitmorians – that honour went to Carmen Leigh Keats. Congratulations to Carmen and best of luck with the making of her new book. Congrats also to my fellow shortlistees – it was nice to note that there were no massive heavy-hitting names on the list this year (at least none I recognised) after last year’s co-awarding of the prize to Jill Jones and Tracey Ryan.
Anyway, nice to be shortlisted. Now I just need to try to convince someone to actually publish these poems.
And, is it just me and have I just noticed, or is the Whitmore Press logo meant to look like the colon-P emoticon guy? :P