Submissions

Submissions

If you would like to apply for membership of the fellowship of the Sixty Odd Poets please submit your work to sixty_odd@aol.com. (take the full stop off the end of the address)

Submitting for a compilation page is currently OPEN

Submissions for Associate Membership of the Sixty Odd Poets is currently open. The current themes are…

Christmas Villainy - Deadline: December 15th for a special to be published online on December 21st. Send me your poetry of Sinister Santas, Crimes against Christmas Humbug Hollering Haters, and Ugly Sisters.

Another Year Over and a New One just Begun - Deadline: December 18th for a special to be published online on December 28th. Send poetry of ringing in the changes, hopes and fears for the future, personal or political

Burns Night - Deadline: 18th January for a special to be published online on January 25th. Send me your Caledonian Capers and Catches.You don’t have to be Scottish to submit your work, but if you are it helps. Can you outburn Burns? Can you send something that can fool people into imagining that it actually is Burns? Or is the style of Ivor Cutler, William McGonnagall or Carol Ann Duffy more to your taste?

Feel free to submit one or two poems to any or all of these calls. However, I am unlikely to accept more than one in each category, and if there are tough calls on space and time, I may slightly discriminate against people who have poems in one category already . Having said that - there are no hard and fast rules. I think hard about everything I read, you will get a reply whatever my decision. I may even ask if I can hold something back for another occasion.

Submitting for your own page is currently CLOSED

I am to open again in mid January 2026 for full membership of the Fellowship of the Sixty Odd. The site publishes a new page each Sunday at 11.00 am UK Time. Usually, every other week sees me publishing six examples of the work of one poet. If you would like to send some poetry to include on a page like this, (and have not featured in this way before) feel free to send me six poems (maybe along with a couple more so that I can have a choice to select from)

Format

I would be grateful if you would submit your poem(s) in a single Word or PDF document. If this is a difficulty, then paste them into the body of an email. Both email or document should have your name and SIXTY ODD SUBMISSION in the title. Please don’t send the email as a reply to a substack post from me - They tend to get lost in a forest of bulky correspondence. Any fairly common clear font at around 12 point is fine. Make the titles slightly bigger and bolder if possible.

There is no maximum or minimum length for poems, nor any favoured style. I am open to blank verse, structured verse, rhyming, whatever. Most web pages that I publish weigh in at about 1500 words with all poems and bios etc, but I have gone well north of 2,000 and well south of 700 on the past.

Biography

Please also include a short third person biography (100 words approx if you are submitting for a page - just a sentence or two if for a compilation) This really shouldn’t be just a list of previous publications - but you can list a couple if you have them. I am more interested in your inspirations, hobbies, and other life details, and maybe web/social media presence. Think of it as a poetic Tinder profile if you like.

Photograph

If you are submitting for a page of your own I would also like a decent head and shoulders photograph, preferably with a plain background if you can as I will be rendering it as a black and white line drawing.

Previously Published Material

I am happy to consider material that has been previously published, as long as your previous publisher is OK with it, and you can credit them on the page.

Simultaneous Submissions

I am also happy with simultaneous submissions, so if you have sent something to me and find a better place for it, feel free to contact me to withdraw the submission. However once I have put it out on the site I would really rather not have to delete it.

Rights

You retain all rights to your work before, during, and after publication. However I request request non-exclusive permission to feature your work on the site, my social media channels, and archives. I would also like to be able to discuss printed publication on the Sixty Odd Press or associated titles with you.

Response Time

I aim to respond to submissions within a couple of weeks but if it all gets out of hand my response might just be -wait a while longer please.

Money

It is free to submit to Sixty Odd Poems but unfortunately I am not in a position to pay contributors. If you would like to donate to help with running costs for the site and allied projects please do so by clicking the “donate to 60 Odd'“ button below, but this is absolutely not obligatory in order to submit. Heaven forbid! You might like to consider some of the other ways of helping which can be found by clicking on the “other ways to help” button.