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* Muriel Craft Bailey Poetry Contest Open April 1 * April is Poetry Month * 2023 Awards Issue Available

Image courtesy of
 the Crane Collection

JOHN M. BELLINGER and CAROLYN OSTRANDER,

Managing Editors

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      Now Open:

The 2025 Muriel Craft Bailey Poetry Contest April 1st to July 15th (Judge: Carolyne Wright – entry $25 plus Submittable fee for up to 5 poems)*

      Hot off the Press:

  • Lost Dogs by Mary-Lou Brockett-Devine, Winner of the 2024 Chapbook Contest is available now
  •  Volume 38 Issue 1 (Summer 2024) of The Comstock Review is available now
  • Volume 38 Issue 2 (Winter 2024-2025) of The Comstock Review was delayed, and will appear soon.

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To order chapbooks and current issues of The Comstock Review, use the Submittable link below

submit

or by mail by sending a check or money order to Comstock Review, P.O. Box 205, LaFayette NY 13084

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     WE HAVE WINNERS!!!!

  • We are delighted to announce that Maura Stanton’s poem “Werner Herzog’s Ecstasy” has won a Pushcart Prize, and will appear in Pushcart Prize L: Best of the Small Presses (2026, the 50th edition)!
  • Congratulations to Mary-Lou Brockett-Devine, Winner of the 2024 Comstock Review Chapbook Contest for the chapbook “Lost Dogs”!
  • Congratulations to Bridget O’Bernstein, Winner of the 2024 Muriel Craft Bailey Memorial Poetry Prize for the poem “Doctor,”!

* Read on for more news of our 2024 Pushcart nominees, the Winner, Honorable Mention and Special Merit poems from the 2024 Muriel Craft Bailey Contest, and the 2024 Winner and Honorable Mention authors of the 2024 Comstock Review Chapbook Contest!

* We still have copies available of recent issues and award-winning chapbooks. You can order them on Submittable.com or by mail (MORE INFORMATION COMING SOON)

Keep our upcoming contests in mind:

The 2025 Kathleen Bryce Niles Chapbook Contest will be open from August 1st to October 31st (Judge Georgia A. Popoff, Poet Laureate of Onondaga County NY – entry $30 plus Submittable fees per manuscript)

Our Fee Free Open Reading Period is closed until next year – see you in 2026! (January 1st to March 31st)

Update on Technical Difficulties and Delays:

Volume 38 Issue 1 of The Comstock Review (Summer 2024, Vol 38 No 1), which ordinarily arrives in August, was delayed, and shipped in February 2025, when the Winter issue usually ships. As a result, the Winter 2024-2025 issue (Vol 39 No 1) was also significantly delayed, and is in production now (May 2025).We sincerely apologize for the many delays we encountered during the last year. We do not anticipate similar delays for the 2025 issues (Volume 39).

If you are a subscriber or contributor, you should receive your copy shortly. Please don’t hesitate to contact the managing editors if you have additional questions. 

As always, thank you for your support.

Carolyn Ostrander and John M. Bellinger,
on behalf of The Comstock Review

We are still working to replace our outdated website. We can’t update our red reminder banner at the moment (see the box above) but that’s only the most visible reason for the redesign. As we work on necessary changes, the website may be unavailable for some short times over the next few months. We apologize for the inconvenience.

Please submit poems, make a purchase, subscribe or donate by using our submittable page (https://comstockreview.submittable.com/ or the instructions for USPS mail below. 

For other questions, send an email message to us at poetry@comstockreview.org. Thank you for your patience!

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The 2025 Muriel Craft Bailey Poetry Contest will accept submissions
April 1st to July 15th.

Butterfly Weed - Bright orange compound flour against background of green leaves

Your best, brightest and most beautiful poems deserve to shine brightly!

         2025 Judge: Carolyne Wright

First Prize $1000; 2nd prize $250; 3rd Prize $100

Submission Fee $25 for up to 5 poems plus Submittable fee, if submitting online.

Important: The Guidelines for Submission are updated annually. Be sure to read them carefully before submitting!

Click the Poetry Contest tab above, or go to https://comstockreview.submittable.com/submit and select Guidelines at the “Poetry Contest” tab there

submit

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2024 Winners!!!! 

Muriel Craft Bailey Poetry Contest – Comstock Review Chapbook Contest – Pushcart Prize Nominees

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2024 Pushcart Nominees:

Maura Stanton – “Werner Herzog’s Ecstasy”
 
Paula Colangelo – “Saudade”
Marda Messick – “Tight-Lipped Red-Lipped Ode”
Jacalyn Shelley – “The Annunciation”
Lisken Van Pelt Dus – “In the Beginning”
Alison Stone – “Demeter in Spring”

On left: contributor list. On right: The Comstock Review, Winter 2024-2025. Abstract art "Chess" by Pinkney Herbert

  The 2024  Muriel Craft Bailey

  Memorial Poetry Contest

Judge: Charles Rafferty

Murial Craft Bailey Memorial Poetry Prize:    Bridget O’Bernstein “Doctor,”

2nd Prize:   B. Fulton Jennes “Why wait for them to ripen?”

3rd Prize:    Julia Cadwallader Staub – “Orchid”

Honorable Mention Poems:

Leslie Danel Batty – “EF-4″
Allison deFreese – “Untraceable”
George C. Harvilla – “Three Minutes and 33 Seconds into the Film I Didn’t Make”
Amy Kesegich – “At Starbucks with Frankenstein’s Monster”
Connie Post – “Call the 800 Number”

Poems of Special Merit

Ansie Baird – “The Landing”
V. A. Bettincourt  – “Kyrie for a Pale Blue Dot”
Cory Mark Brown – “Quandary”
Monica Carroll – “Everybody’s uncle”
James Harmon Clinton – “One Mind Common”
John Davis – “Premises”
Jean Anne Feldeisen – “No need”
Deborah Gerrish – “A Précis on the Stuff We Breathe”
Amy Haddad – “Sheep in a CT Scanner”
Karen Holmberg – “Begging the Question”
Zebulon Huset – “Beneath a Scatter of Clouds”
Francis Klein – “Piano Tuning“
Clara MacLean – “Bone Window”
Allen Shadow – “Walter’s Luncheonette”
Jeanine Stevens – “Where Light Enters In”
Seneca Turner – “This Poem”
Jennifer Veech – “Under Contract”
Caroline Wellman – “Morning Stars”

Volume 38 Issue 1 of The Comstock Review (Summer 2024, Vol 38 No 1), which ordinarily arrives in August, was delayed, and shipped in February 2025, when the Winter issue usually ships. As a result, the Winter 2024-2025 issue (Vol 39 No 1) was also significantly delayed, and is in production now (May 2025).
We sincerely apologize for the many delays we encountered during the last year. We do not anticipate similar delays for the 2025 issues (Volume 39).

If you are a subscriber or contributor, you should receive
your copy shortly. Please don’t hesitate to contact
the managing editors if you have additional questions.

As always, thank you for your support.

Carolyn Ostrander and John M. Bellinger,
on behalf of The Comstock Review

submit****************************************

submit

Important message to contestants: If you have questions, please send a message via Submittable (the submit button will take you there); or if you sent your submission by USPS mail, you can email them to poetry@comstockreview.org

 

HOT OFF THE PRESS!!!!

Front and Back covers of chapbook "Lost Dogs" by Mary-Lou Brockett-Devine

The 2024 Comstock Review Chapbook Contest Results!!!

Judge:  Abayomi Animashaun

Winner: Mary-Lou Brockett-Devine’s chapbook – Lost Dogs

Prize: $1000 plus publication and 50 author’s copies

Honorable Mention:

Amanda Hiland’s chapbook manuscript – de/extinction

Kate Hovey’s chapbook manuscript – Classic

 Finalists: 

Daniel Arbino for Bloodstreams

R.J. Begiebing for Awakenings

Partridge Boswell for SAMIZDEMOS: A Voter’s Handbook

Douglas Currier for Minor Poet

R.G. Evans for The Dignity of Ice / Twelve Steps from Paradise

Suzanne Freeman for The Moon Doesn’t Love Us Anymore

Constance Hanstedt for Coming Up For Air

Jerry Krajnak for Auditions

Chris Lisieski for Ephemera

Sean MacPhee for The Idea of You

David Meyer for The Man In Lover with Silence

Rebecca Morton for 10.19.24, Love Poems for Ann

Maureen Mulhern for Meltdown

Elisabeth Murawski for Voyage to the End

Sandra Newton for Telling History, Learning Geography

Hoyt Rogers for Maker

Kelly Rowe for The Wind Telephone

Irene Sherlock for Rorschach

Ashleigh Synnott for the technology i assume (of hammers & little birds)

Emily Winakur for Dream Journal

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The 2025 Jessie Bryce Niles  Chapbook Contest

will open for submissions August 1st

Prize: $1000 plus publication and 50 author’s copies.

Judge:  Georgia A. Popoff, Poet Laureate of Onondaga County, NY

Accepting submission from Aug 1st to Oct. 31st 2025 (postmark or online submission date).

  • Entry Fee: $30/chapbook (includes copy of winning chapbook)
    plus Submittable fees

Important: The Guidelines for submission have been updated. Be sure to read them carefully before submitting!

To see our updated submission guidelines, click the Chapbook Contest tab above, or go to https://comstockreview.submittable.com/submit and select Guidelines at the “Poetry Contest” tab there

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Volume 38 Issue 1 of The Comstock Review (Summer 2024),
which ordinarily arrives in August, was delayed, and is shipping now.
We sincerely apologize for the many delays we encountered last year.

If you are a subscriber or contributor, you should receive your copy shortly. Please don’t hesitate to contact the managing editors if you have additional questions.

 

The Winter 2024-2025 issue will arrive soon.  

As always, thank you for your support.

Carolyn Ostrander and John M. Bellinger,
on behalf of The Comstock Review

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 The 2024  Muriel Craft Bailey

 Memorial Poetry Contest Results:

 

Judge: Charles Rafferty

Murial Craft Bailey Memorial Poetry Prize:

Bridget O’Bernstein “Doctor,”

2nd Prize:

B. Fulton Jennes “Why wait for them to ripen?”

3rd Prize:

Julia Cadwallader Staub – “Orchid”

Honorable Mention Poems:

Leslie Danel Batty – “EF-4″
Allison deFreese – “Untraceable”
George C. Harvilla – “Three Minutes and 33 Seconds into the Film I Didn’t Make”
Amy Kesegich – “At Starbucks with Frankenstein’s Monster”
Connie Post – “Call the 800 Number”

Poems of Special Merit

Ansie Baird – “The Landing”
V. A. Bettincourt  – “Kyrie for a Pale Blue Dot”
Cory Mark Brown – “Quandary”
Monica Carroll – “Everybody’s uncle”
James Harmon Clinton – “One Mind Common”
John Davis – “Premises”
Jean Anne Feldeisen – “No need”
Deborah Gerrish – “A Précis on the Stuff We Breathe”
Amy Haddad – “Sheep in a CT Scanner”
Karen Holmberg – “Begging the Question”
Zebulon Huset – “Beneath a Scatter of Clouds”
Francis Klein – “Piano Tuning“
Clara MacLean – “Bone Window”
Allen Shadow – “Walter’s Luncheonette”
Jeanine Stevens – “Where Light Enters In”
Seneca Turner – “This Poem”
Jennifer Veech – “Under Contract”
Caroline Wellman – “Morning Stars”

You can read these poems and our Pushcart Prize-winning poem 

Maura Stanton – “Werner Herzog’s Ecstasy”

in the Winter 2024-2025 issue of The Comstock Review (Vol 38.2), coming soon!

submit

Important message to contestants: If you have questions, please send a message via Submittable (the submit button will take you there); or if you sent your submission by USPS mail, you can email them to poetry@comstockreview.org

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Recent Comstock Review Pushcart Nominees

2024:

Paula Colangelo – “Saudade”
Marda Messick – “Tight-Lipped Red-Lipped Ode”
Jacalyn Shelley – “The Annunciation”
Maura Stanton – “Werner Herzog’s Ecstasy” (Pushcart Prize Winner!)
Lisken Van Pelt Dus – “In the Beginning”
Alison Stone – “Demeter in Spring”

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2023:
 
Connie Post – “Aftermath”
Molly Vaux – “Innocents”
Lyman Grant – “The Gardener at Nightfall”
Dawn Stahura – “That One Diner Off I-65 in Jasper County”
Nancy Dafoe – “The Narrative”
Wally Swist – “Green Horn”

2022:

Rebecca Brock, “Sometime In The Late Age of A Long Marriage”
Linda Neal Reising, “After Learning That a Woman And Her Baby
          Were Killed In The Bombing Of A Ukrainian Hospital”
Frank Dixon Graham, “Tractor”
Deborah Doolittle, “Elizabeth Bishop’s Fish”
Sharon Charde, “Things”
Judith M. Montgomery, “Mother’s Day At Aspen Ridge Assisted Living”
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Also available for purchase!!!!

The Comstock Review Summer 2024 Cover art collage The Inside Story by Michael Sickler multimedia image

Cover art: “The Inside Story” by Michael Sickler, multimedia collage

The long-awaited Summer 2024 Issue of The Comstock Review (volume 38.1) is still available!

Purchase together with the upcoming (delayed) Winter 2024-2025 issue using our Submittable page (see button below)

OR

Send a check or money order to
The Comstock Review / P.O. Box 205 / LaFayette NY 13084

 

submit

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DON’T FORGET TO SUBSCRIBE, SO YOU DON’T MISS A THING!

Rising printing, binding and shipping costs have risen beyond our issue and subscription prices. As of April 1st 2025, our prices will increase from $12.50 to $15.00 an issue to allow us to continue providing you a high-quality poetry journal. The new submission costs are listed in red below:

SUBSCRIBERS KEEP US GOING -AND-  SUPPORT OUR POETS

One year – $25 Two Years – $45 (2 issues per year)
As of April 1, 2025: One year – $30; Two Years – $55

You can use Submittable for ease of subscription,
or send a note and check or money order by mail to:

The Comstock Review / P.O. Box 205 / LaFayette NY 13084

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Dear Poets and Readers:

For a long time now, our contributors have watched as the price of publishing poetry slowly rises here and there. There is no way around it, publishing a journal costs money. Some publications are supported by institutions, large grants or with other sources of outside funding – funding that can come with a certain cost in editorial freedom.

The Comstock Review has always been able to cover most of its operating costs with subscriptions and contest monies. As with most publications, we charge for some things. We have to. And this year, to continue to bring our journal to faithful readers and provide a venue for poets to showcase their work, we have even had to increase our per-issue cost from $12.50 to $15.00 per copy.

But we also realize that any charges, however small they may seem to some, require a degree of financial sacrifice. Not everyone can afford these things.

So, every January we offer a free reading. It is our way of saying thank you. Thank you for reading our publication. Thank you for supporting us in this nearly 40-year journey. Without you, we would not be here. This magazine has always been yours.

So, we thank you as well. Always. We won’t forget you.

Please. Submit. Let us see what you are doing these days. And let us know that you appreciate our poets. Read the issues, and subscribe when you can.

Find us on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100064631562091

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IF SUBMITTING, SUBSCRIBING OR PURCHASING AN ISSUE OR CHAPBOOK ONLINE,

YOU CAN USE THE BUTTON ABOVE.

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Still available!

Winner of the 2023 Jessie Bryce Niles Chapbook Contest

  Cover of chapbook "Things Will Be Better in Bountiful" by Robin Michel. On left several paragraphs of text; on right cover art in black white and gray. A woman with white pants, a black shirt and black cap leans on fender of a black car to light a cigarette in front of a white garage door.
Things Will Be Better In Bountiful
           by Robin Michel,

 

 
 
 
2023 Jessie Bryce Niles Chapbook Contest
Sponsored by Comstock Review, Inc.

Judge: Kathleen Bryce Niles-Overton

Winner: Robin Michel, Things Will Be Better in Bountiful        
(publication, $1000 prize and 50 copies)

Honorable Mention and a 1 year subscription to The Comstock Review went to:

Dion O’Reilly, Blessing The Burn

Jenna Rindo, Bone River Fever

Ellen Roberts Young, Beauty and Strength: Artemisia Gentileschi and Her Subjects

For a complete list of finalists and more information,

see the Chapbook Contest page

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A few copies of the 2022 Winning Chapbook are still available

Jay Udall from Oakton, Virginia
     Reach Beyond Reach

Order by mail! Send a check or money order to
Comstock Review Chapbooks c/o / P.O. Box 205 / LaFayette NY 13084

For more information and a list of Honorable mentions and Finalists, click the Chapbook Contest tab in the menu above

 

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Winners of the 2023 MurielCraft Bailey Poetry Contest!

 Thank you to Judge Danusha Laméris
2018-2020 Poet Laureate of Santa
Cruz County, California.

First Prize: $1,000 (The Muriel Craft Bailey Memorial Award) Jodi Balas “Bone Density”

Second Prize: $250 David Thoreen “Maybe”

Third Prize: $100 David Thoreen “Even in Spring Our Thoughts Sometimes Lapse into Darkness”

Honorable Mentions:

Connie Post “Aftermath”
Davi Gray “In Which She Embarked Upon a Voyage”

Honorable Mentions receive a one-year subscription.

(for a list of finalists from 2023 including Special Merit Winners, and other past winners, go to the Poetry Contest tab)

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2023 Poetry contest winning poems,
honorable mentions and special merit winners all appeared in

The Comstock Review Fall/Winter 2023-2024 Issue,

Cover of Fall Winter 2023 Issue of The Comstock Review. On left a list of contributors. In center a vertical spine with issue name and number. On right words "The Comstock Review Fall Winter 2023" above painting House on Fire Number 1 by Linda Schrank. Abstract image: roughly circular mesh of ribbons in black, white, gray, yellow, orange and red

Cover art: “House on Fire No. 1″ by Linda Schrank”

still available by sending a check or money order to
The Comstock Review / P.O. Box 205 / LaFayette NY 13084

 

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round white fluffy dandelion seedhead above loosely woven green grass nest

“Dandelion”by Kevin Morrow,
cover art
The Comstock Review
Spring / Summer 2023
Vol 37 Issue 1 

Did you know?

You can make a tax-deductible donation to support our work

Comstock Review, Inc. is a 501c3 nonprofit organization registered in the state of New York. Donations are tax-deductible.

Questions about submissions, subscriptions or donations can be emailed to poetry@comstockreview.org

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Comstock Review, Inc.

In the winter of 2019-2020 the editors of The Comstock Review decided to create a new organizational structure. Publication of The Comstock Review and all associated activities (including the poem and chapbook contests) were absorbed into Comstock Review, Inc., a newly formed 501c-3 non-profit organization. The Comstock Review, our flagship journal, continues to be produced by our seasoned editorial board, while day-to-day operations are carried out with the help and oversight of the Board of Directors of “CRInc.” Betsy Anderson, Managing Editor from  is now also the Board President.

Stay tuned for updates to our website and other communication links!

SEE MORE ABOUT THESE CHANGES AND HOW YOU CAN HELP HERE

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Even when submissions are closed, you can still subscribe to The Comstock Review, buy single journal issues, and purchase chapbooks on our Submittable page. Submit Online using the button below.submit

 

The Comstock Review Fall/Winter 2023-2024