SWEET POETRY CONTEST 2026 RESULTS
“A Duplex for Nerve Root Signature”—Sarah Carey
So much skill in this beautiful poem! The duplex form is difficult to master, but here the poet makes it seem effortless. How fitting for the poet to use this form for this particular topic, as Jericho Brown, the inventor of the Duplex, called it a “mutt of a poem.” This poem brilliantly expresses the agony of witnessing the pain of an aging dog with its use of repetition and white space, and it is woven with such tenderness, such exquisite imagery, the poet’s anxiety becomes palpable. Powerful work. –Meghan Sterling, Judge
“Again”—Bailey Quinn
I read this poem and realized I had been holding my breath. The poet makes such deft use of the couplet form, weaving images with pauses, the personal with the universal. Rhythmic, expressive, elliptical, by the end of the poem I had been through fields and a marriage and everything was on fire. –Meghan Sterling, Judge
“Our Dead Pancreases”—Allyson Wuerth
FINALISTS:
“Raised Beds”—Robin Rosen Chang
“Chez Pierre et Geneviève Pâtisserie”—Diane DeCillis
“Skip the Tragic Films”—Max Heinegg
“A Dream is a Door”—Ashley Kirkland
“Among Remains”—Diane LeBlanc
“The starlings are back in coal-smudged November”—Bailey Quinn
Judge’s bio: Meghan Sterling (she/her/hers) is a working mother living in Maine whose poetry has been published or is forthcoming in Tahoma Literary Review, the Los Angeles Review, the Colorado Review, Rhino Poetry, Hunger Mountain, Crab Creek Review, Painted Bride Quarterly and many other journals. Her collections are These Few Seeds (Terrapin Books), Self-Portrait with Ghosts of the Diaspora (Harbor Editions), Comfort the Mourners (Everybody Press), View from a Borrowed Field (Lily Poetry Review’s Paul Nemser Book Prize), and You Are Here to Break Apart (Lily Poetry Review Press). Her next collection, Sick Letters from the Lovebed (Harbor Editions) is forthcoming in late 2026. She was named Poet Laureate of the city of Gardiner, Maine in August, 2025. Read her work at meghansterling.com.
