Pushcart Nominations
Each year, we nominate six poems for the Pushcart Prize from collections published by Kelsay Books that year. Additionally, we nominate three poems from each biannual issue of The Orchards Poetry Journal, our affiliated literary magazine, for a total of six Orchards nominations each year.
We reject all requests from poets to consider their work for nomination. We make our selection based on the poems we think have the best chance of receiving the prize. Any requests for special consideration will be ignored.
Congratulations to our recent Pushcart Prize nominees:
2024 Kelsay Books
- Jean Biegun, “Legacy” from Edge Effects
- Nina Clements, “October Lake” from Choosing the Lake
- Shaheen Dil, “The Red Thread” from The Boat Maker’s Art
- Kara Dorris, “Nocturne with Flame” and “Stargazing Where Stop Means Yield” from HitBox
- Chuck Madansky, “Sky Writing” from If Life Is Love
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Winter 2024
- Merrill Cole, “The Point of Seeing”
- Rachael Ikins, “Death’s Contract”
- Phil Powrie, “Each to each”
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Summer 2024
- T.F. Jennings, “Carnival After Hours”
- Mary Ellen Redmond, “Joy is not made to be a crumb”
- Richard Taylor, “Daughter”
2023 Kelsay Books
- Nadia Arioli, “All Surroundings Are Referred to High Water” from Be Still: Poems for Kay Sage
- Gary Grossman, “Apostrophe” from Lyrical Years
- Batnadiv HaKarmi, “When My Grandfather Was Abram” from The Love of Mortal Beings
- Jane Yevgenia Muschenetz, “For Those of Us Forced to Flee” from All the Bad Girls Wear Russian Accents
- Jessica Genia Simon, “Ever After” from Built of All I Shape and Name
- Anastasia Vassos, “Nostos” from Nostos
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Winter 2023
- Terry Firkins, “Rapprochement”
- Will Hemmer, “Aborning”
- Philip Jason, “Runover”
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Summer 2023
- Grace Martin, “Tracking the Source, Losing the Trail”
- Samuel Samba, “Hardened in no small way”
- Elinor Ann Walker, “Highway 64, Tennessee”
2022 Kelsay Books
- C.L. Bledsoe, “It’s Snowing Inside My Daughter’s Head” from Having a Baby to Save a Marriage
- Ann Bookman, “Shimmering” from Blood Lines
- Rebecca Brock, “The Stories They Are Telling Now” from Each Bearing Out
- Ted Charnley, “For Lady Macbeth, in the 21st Century” from An Invocation of Fragments
- Allison Joseph, “Running While Black” from Any Proper Weave
- Yasmin Kloth, “I’ve Named These Ashes” from Ancestry Unfinished: Poems of a Lost Generation
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Winter 2022
- Mike James, “Slightly Lost”
- Nicholas Kriefall, “Alpha”
- Marceline White, “Cleaved”
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Summer 2022
- Bryan Edward Helton, “An Evening Walk”
- Bill Howell, “Wish Fish”
- Sodïq Oyèkànmí, “paper boat”
2021 Kelsay Books
- Riley Bounds, “Doxology” from Hands of Years
- Katerina Canyon, “A Petition for Unrecognized Children” from Surviving Home
- Cristina M.R. Norcross, “New Dimensions” from The Sound of a Collective Pulse
- Linda Neal Reising, “Emmaline” from Stone Roses
- Menachem Z. Rosensaft, “Warsaw Trees” from Poems Born in Bergen-Belsen
- V.J. Saraf, “Lullaby” from For Once, Then Nothing
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Winter 2021
- Unlisted
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Summer 2021
- Steve Gehrke, “Lincoln at His Mother’s Death”
- Ken Meisel, “Witness”
- Rebecca A. Spears, “The Claim”
2020 Kelsay Books
- Gilbert Allen, “Lost and Found” from Believing in Two Bodies
- Randal A. Burd, Jr., “Humblest Apologies” from Memoirs of a Witness Tree
- Richard Holinger, “Treasure” from North of Crivitz
- Tom Holmes, “Hic Sunt Vaccas” from Material Matters
- Andrew Jones, “Mixtape Composition” from Liner Notes
- Peter Waldor, “Two Stray Dogs” from Something About the Way
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Winter 2020
- C.B. Anderson, “Storage and Retrieval”
- John Grey, “Pony Tracks in the Snow”
- William R. Stoddart, “Old Lady on Plane”
The Orchards Poetry Journal: Summer 2020
- Lisa McCabe, “Ex-Husband, Old Dog”
- Erik Richardson, “Dharma’s last lesson on the illusion of self”
- Wendy Sloan, “Twilight”
Nominees from previous years are not listed on this page.