The 2026 Backwaters Prize in Poetry competition is accepting submissions now through May 1.

The winner will be awarded a $2,000 cash prize and the honorable mention will be awarded a $1,000 cash prize. Both winners will be awarded the publication of the book by the University of Nebraska Press under its imprint, Backwaters Press.

The judge for the 2026 contest is Diane Seuss, the author of six books of poetry, including Modern Poetry (2024), a finalist for the National Book Award and the Griffin Poetry Prize; and frank: sonnets (2021), winner of the Los Angeles Times Book Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Award, and the Pulitzer Prize. Seuss was a 2020 Guggenheim Fellow, and she is a Chancellor of the Academy of American Poets. Her seventh collection, Althea: Poems, is forthcoming from Graywolf Press in 2027.

The 2025 winner is HUMہم by Sanam Sheriff, which will be published in October 2026. The honorable mention is The Law at Night by Elizabeth Barnett, which will be published in March 2027. Both were selected by Maggie Smith, the New York Times bestselling author of eight books of poetry and prose, including You Could Make This Place Beautiful, Good Bones, Goldenrod, Keep Moving, and My Thoughts Have Wings.

For more details, please visit the Backwaters Prize page.