INDIGO SPRING POETRY PRIZE 2025

PRIZES

1st £250; 2nd £100; 3rd £50 ... plus magazine publication in either Reach Poetry or The Dawntreader

OUR JUDGE

Thank you for taking part.

VICTORIA GATEHOUSE

Victoria Gatehouse is a Zoologist, award-winning poet and children’s writer.

Her poetry has been broadcast on BBC radio and she has been widely published in magazines including The Rialto and Mslexia. Her pamphlet The Mechanics of Love (Smith|Doorstop) was selected as a ‘Laureate’s Choice’ by Carol Ann Duffy.

Victoria has won, and been placed in, many competitions and is also a three-times winner of The Poetry News Members’ Competition. She was highly commended for the Gingko Prize, 2023. Her Indigo Dreams collection The Hawthorn Bride was published in 2024.

RESULTS

JUDGE'S REPORT

1st Prize: Ithaka by Bex Hainsworth

2nd Prize: Chrism by Caroline Smith

3rd Prize: Wallers by Kerry Darbishire

HIGHLY COMMENDED

Dragonflies are notoriously absent in Central London – Christian Ward

Gaza (December 2023) – MaryAnn Perkins

On the Question of a Tattoo – Mary Gilonne

Sloth – Stephanie Powell

Storm Damage – Annie Kissack

Study of Zoochosis in a Circus Lion – Kathy Miles

COMMENDED

Apoptosis – Audrey Ardern-Jones

Badger – Natasha Tate

City – Fiona Dimond

Ghazal of Belonging – Mel Tibbs

My Shy Wren-mother - Annie Kissack

Nailbar – A C Clarke

Overproof Jamaican Rum – Jenny Mitchell

Snapshot – WW2 – Marion Ashton

Stepfather – Jenny Mitchell

The girl who split in two - Liz Byrne

The Night David Tennant Almost Touched My Knee - Linda Burnett

The Watchers – Marc Woodward

Waterfall - Martin Rieser

INDIGO FIRST COLLECTION COMPETITION 2024

Thank you to everyone who entered our competition.

Choosing winners proved to be particularly hard this time, so much so that neither of us would surrender a collection from the final 3. Therefore, for the first time in the history of IDP competitions, we have chosen 3 brilliant collections as winners. All will be published towards the end of 2025. All are debut collections.

Sadly there were quite a few good entires that had to be disqualified this time as they included identifying marks with pages showing the poet's name. Please always check this when entering any of our competitions. We want it to be scrupulously fair.

WINNERS

Under the Lippy by Angelena Demaria

The last one picked by Stuart Handysides

And They Are Clapping by Sara Nesbitt Gibbons

HIGHLY COMMENDED

I do a workshop on the poetry of Sex – Alison Campbell

Women’s Worth – Jane Edmonds

Cherrywood Bowl – Dan Janoff

A Wonderful Nothing – Oliver Marlow

COMMENDED

Curse Wish – Gillian Barker

Anachronos – Martin Briggs

Scratchface Lane – Nigel Crisp

The Last of the Orangedale Orgies – Simon MacCulloch

I have a body no longer – Jess McNulty

I wish I could for get to read – Laurence Morris

I, Cookham – Marie Papier

The Tales of a Bad Daughter - Inga Piotrowska

Quijote and the Rollie – Gloria Sanders

little hims – Kieran Setright

When ideation becomes intent – Penny Shutt

Time Sits Still – Georgina Titmus

Fish / Food – Claire Watt

On Your Way to Somewhere Else – Catherine Whitaker

Congratulations to all those named and for making it such an enjoyable competition to judge - Dawn and Ronnie

INDIGO SPRING POETRY PRIZE 2024

RESULTS

OUR JUDGE: VIC PICKUP

1st PLACE

2nd PLACE

3rd PLACE

Confiscating blue from the city by Deborah Finding

Terminology by Julie Filimon

The Boyfriends by Michael Brown

JUDGES COMMENTS & WINNING POEMS

INDIGO FIRST COLLECTION COMPETITION 2023

ONEIRONAUT by Leah Larwood

FRAGILE ISLANDS by Christine Hollywood

THE WINNERS