Poets, here's a chance to win some recognition for your work and a grand to boot. The Shelter Island Library is now shepherding the Bliss Morehead Poetry Grant, through which unpublished poets age 17 or older who live on the East End can win $1,000 by way of a poetry contest.
The deadline for submissions is April 8, and the winner will be announced on April 18. A poetry reading on April 22 at the library will feature the winning entry.
To be awarded every April for the next 10 years through the contest, the grant is the creation of Mike Zisser of Shelter Island in memory of his wife, Bliss Morehead Zisser, a poet, editor, creative consultant, and founder of the Shelter Island Poetry Project. She once cautioned against taking words "for granted," advocating "weeding out the excessive and overwrought so the best may shine." Also of note to contestants: "Style and diction and point of view matter a lot to me." This first year's theme is "delight and despair."
Everything you need for the application can be found at shelterislandpubliclibrary.org. Questions can be directed to Jocelyn Ozolins at [email protected].