Announcing French Quarter Journal's first poetry contest, and FQJ poetry editor/judge Skye Jackson is looking for lightning to strike.

Publication and cash prizes for winners: $100, $50 and $25. Entry fee is $5 per poem. Enter through our Submittable page. Contest Deadline May 15, 2021. Publication in June 2021. Full details below.

​A Letter from FQJ Poetry Editor Skye Jackson

Hello! My name is Skye Jackson and I am the editor of the FQJ poetry column, Stanzas. I am so excited to be a part of this publication. My plan is to bring the lit to this literary magazine – so buckle up, readers! It’s going to be a wonderful ride!

Before we get started, I’d like to give you a little bit of information about my background and goals for FQJ. I started writing poetry at 14 years old at the New Orleans Center for Creative Arts. During my time there, I had the immense privilege of studying under the tutelage of incredible writers like Andrea Young, Brad Richard and Lara Naughton. Once I graduated from NOCCA, I went on to study poetry at Louisiana State University. After that, I graduated from Mississippi College School of Law, where I obtained my Juris Doctorate in the study of common and civil law.

After law school, I moved to Los Angeles, where I began writing my first chapbook of poetry, A Faster Grave, which was published here in New Orleans by Antenna Press. Since 2018, I’ve studied at the Creative Writing Workshop at the University of New Orleans, where I previously served as an Associate Poetry Editor of Bayou Magazine.

I am so excited to bring my skills and knowledge to the FQJ! I know we’re going to have a lot of fun together – just you wait and see!

During my tenure at FQJ, I’ll be looking for lightning to strike. I want to read poems that strike the core of who we are as human beings; poems that shed light on this increasingly dark world that we live in. I want poems about your experiences in the French Quarter and surrounding areas.

​Did you fall in love at Carousel Bar? Did you dance the night away on a dark street corner with fellow revelers? Did you cross paths with an unforgettable stranger as you picked up a morning coffee at Café Envie? Tell me about it, stud. In poetic form, of course! Make me laugh. Make me cry. Make me feel something. But always keep it real.

Remember, I’m looking for lightning to strike, and I always know it when I see it.

I’m looking forward to reading your poems and sharing all that is real with you.

Until we find each other once again in the streets …

Yours,

Skye

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Don't miss Skye's March 2021 Stanzas column, Unexpected Places: In the Pool.

Enter FQJ's First Poetry Contest!

Judged by Skye Jackson

• First Place: $100 and publication in FQJ

• Second Place: $50 and publication in FQJ

• Third Place: $25 and publication in FQJ

Entry fee is $5 per poem. Enter through our Submittable page. Contest Deadline May 15, 2021. Publication in June 2021.

Contest Guidelines:

Here at French Quarter Journal, we are looking for poems that push beyond the realm of what we know but also capture experiences that are real and deeply felt.

Right now, our goal is to publish poetry that speaks to the experience of living, working in or enjoying the French Quarter, New Orleans and/or southeastern Louisiana. Have you written a poem that encapsulates your experience in one of these areas? Did you make it thrilling and vivid? Do you think other readers will feel what you’ve written? If so, we want your work.

Submit poems that are fresh and exciting. Give us pieces that capture what it means to be a part of the vibrant fabric that is New Orleans and South Louisiana.