WELCOME TO THE  6th ANNUAL SAINT PAUL SIDEWALK POETRY CONTEST

Deadline: Friday March 15, 2013 at Midnight

THE 2013 CONTEST IS NOW CLOSED

Five poets will win $150 prizes and permanent honor in city sidewalks.

We want your short, original poems — elegant rhymes, playful limericks, bar napkin free verse, classroom haikus... The Department of Public Works and Public Art Saint Paul invite all Saint Paul residents to enter our sixth annual sidewalk poetry contest. With 5 new winners, we will expand our collection to nearly 50 poems and 700 installations across the city. There’s a poet in every one of us, so help pave our streets with poetry, and enter!

Here are two examples of previous contest winners:


By Alma Palahniuk

Dementia

I reach for a name, a song, a tune
and memories scatter,
minnows fleeing
a toothy pike.

I catch a few
laggards.
But know these are nothing
to the hundred fish that fled.


By Naomi Cohn

For more examples, visit: www.stpaul.gov/poetry

Ready to see the contest guidelines and enter? Click Next

Everyday Poems for City Sidewalk was created by Marcus Young, City Artist in Residence, with support from Public Art Saint Paul in collaboration with the Saint Paul Department of Public Works. It is supported by the City of Saint Paul’s Public Art Ordinance, Saint Paul Public Library, The Saint Paul, F. R. Bigelow, Mardag and McKnight Foundations, ArtPlace America, and Readings by Writers. This activity is made possible in part by a grant provided by the Minnesota State Arts Board through an appropriation by the Minnesota State Legislature from the State’s general fund and arts and cultural heritage fund enabled by a vote of the people of Minnesota on November 4, 2008.