whimperbang: journal of the arts: The Whimperbang Poetry Chapbook Prize Gold Star Program Gold Star Free Tip Jar Option

We welcome work from new, emerging, and established writers alike. We encourage all voices, especially those that have been historically marginalized or under-represented, to submit.

We value poems of all styles, but will automatically reject work that is discriminatory or hateful. We strongly support the notion that each poem in a chapbook's collection have a unifying relationship to the whole (gestalt), and that each poem is strong enough to stand alone.

• The Whimperbang Poetry Chapbook Prize honors a collection of original poetry in English by a single author; translations are not eligible.
• The winning poet will receive a $250 honorarium upon publication, plus 10 copies of their book.
• The winning chapbook will be professionally designed and published in 2027 by Whimperbang Press (at no cost to the poet), as a perfect-bound, paperback chapbook (6 x 9 inches in size).
• The winning chapbook will be available for sale on the Whimperbang Press website, and through affiliate bookstores.
• Entries must be submitted from October 5 through December 31, 2026 (11:59 pm, EST).
• All entries should be made via Duosuma. (No email or postal submissions.)
• Manuscripts should be approximately 20 to 40 pages of poems, submitted in a single document.
• Poets may enter more than one manuscript to the contest, but each submission must be a separate entry, each incurring its own fee.
• Accepted file formats: MS Word (.doc or docx) or PDF (Note: you will need to provide a Word version if chosen as winner).
• Please use a standard readable 12 point font. Times New Roman and Garamond are examples.
• Each new poem should start at the top of a new page.
• Please do NOT include illustrations, photography or other artwork in your manuscript.
• Poems should be single-spaced with double-spacing between stanzas.
• The author’s name, bio or any other identifying information must not appear in the title page or body of the manuscript. All efforts will be made to ensure that manuscripts are read and judged anonymously. File names should be formatted thusly: LastNameFirstInitial_PChapbook_2026; For example: AngelouM_PChapbook_2026
• The title page should contain the proposed title of the chapbook and a brief synopsis/description of the collection and/or theme of the body of work. Author contact information and bio is to be collected separately via Duosuma. (do not include on title page)
• Please include a Table of Contents page listing the poems in order (page numbers are optional).
• Individual poems of the manuscript may have been previously published in magazines, journals, or anthologies, but the work as a whole must be unpublished. (Please provide an acknowledgments page of any previously published poems at the end of the manuscript.)
• Simultaneous submissions are permitted, but entrants are asked to please notify Whimperbang immediately if a manuscript becomes accepted/committed elsewhere. This is best accomplished by using the “withdraw” feature on Duosuma.
• We do not accept written or visual works that are AI generated or plagiarized.
• The suggested entry fee of $15.00 is payable through the "Tip Jar" on Duosuma (our submission manager system). Please pay what you are able. If we find that this is being abused, we reserve the right to shift to a mandatory fee. There are no refunds once you’ve submitted to the contest.