Middle West Press

Author of the award-winning poetry collection “Welcome to FOB Haiku: War Poems from Inside the Wire,”  U.S. Army veteran, journalist, essayist, and literary activist  Randy “Sherpa” Brown  (he/him) will serve as one of the contest judges of the first-ever War Poetry Postcard Project . Contest organizers seek short poems   (equal to 26 lines or less, including line-spaces) regarding   effects of armed conflict, state violence, and military service . The contest is co-sponsored by  Collateral Journal  and  Middle West Press . On a panel of three judges, Brown joins  Collateral  Journal  founding editor and WPPP keynoter   Abby E. Murray  (they/them), as well as poet, fellow editor , and literary activist Lisa Stice . Brown is also the founder and editor-publisher of Middle West Press. A cohort of three winning poems will be selected, then  produced, printed, and distributed as ready-to-mail 4x6-inch postcards  late...

Author of poetry collections including “Letters from Conflict” and “Permanent Change of Station,” North Carolina poet and U.S. Marine Corps spouse Lisa Stice  (she/her) will serve as one of three judges for the inaugural War Poetry Postcard Project (WPPP)  contest.  Contest organizers seek short poems (equal to 26 lines or less, including line-spaces) regarding effects of armed conflict, state violence, and military service . The contest is co-sponsored by  Collateral Journal  and  Middle West Press . As announced last week , Collateral  Journal founding editor and WPPP keynoter Abby E. Murray (they/them) will also serve as a contest judge. A cohort of three winning poems will be selected, then  produced, printed, and distributed as ready-to-mail 4x6-inch postcards later this summer.  Contest deadline is May 3, 2025. Everyone who enters will receive a set of the three winning postcard poems.  Organizers hope that the postcards wil...

Author of the poetry collections “Hail and Farewell” (Perugia Press, 2019) and the forthcoming “Recovery Commands” (Ex Ophidia Press, 2025),  Abby E. Murray  (they/them) is now also author of the “keynote” poem for the War Poetry Postcard Project (WPPP) . Murray’s poem  “Hello, I am Not a Soldier,”  wrestles with a daily dissonance felt as a spouse in an active-duty U.S. Army family:  “[...] Wherever I go, I cling to my hope / like a weapon I have been trained to love.”  The work was first published on-line in  Rattle  magazine Nov. 17, 2024. Now, it will be produced and shared with others on a postcard! “Like many of our fellow citizen-poets, we’ve been struggling to find constructive, useful ways to deploy our words and talents in a world of increasing  fascism, racism, genocide, and cruelty ,” says Randy Brown , editor-publisher of the independent micro-press  Middle West Press LLC . “For us, Abby’s poem provides a perfect example o...