New Writers Poetry Competition 2026 – Results

We are delighted to reveal that our Head Judge, JLM Morton, has chosen the winners of the New Writers Poetry Competition.

After receiving more than 700 entries to the competition, it was no easy task picking the poems that made it to the longlist and beyond. Thank you to everyone who entered. Massive congratulations to those who were picked to win a prize or who made the shortlist or longlist.

As we have come to expect from our writing competitions, the standard was very impressive, and it was an honour to read so many fantastic, moving and interesting poems over the last couple of months.

Also, the competition helped raise money for two fantastic UK-registered charities: Duchenne UK and the Funzi & Bodo Trust. We transferred the donations (5% of entry fee proceeds to each charity), and we are confident they will use the money wisely.

We extend our warmest thanks to our Head Judge, JLM Morton, whose careful and astute consideration of the longlisted entries is very much appreciated. If you would like to read JLM’s recently published poetry collection, Borrowed Ground, you can purchase a copy HERE.

And so, to the five winners, and the poems that were picked for the shortlist and longlist. (Click on the titles to read the five winning entries.) The winners will also be published in the next New Writers Anthology (the last one can be found HERE) which is scheduled to emerge in early 2027.

Note that, for any budding novelists among you, the New Writers Novel Prize – with a top prize of £1,000 – is open for entries until 31st October 2026 – you can find the competition details HERE.

Winners

First Prize (£1,000): Daphne by Will Magee

Poet bio: Will Magee is a writer born in 1992 who grew up in London and now lives in Cambridgeshire. This is his first published poem.

Head Judge’s Comments: Daphne opens mid-transformation, its in medias res urgency matched by imagery so strange and vivid it feels almost animate on the page. The formal control of the poem makes the final turn astonishing: after all the dispersals of body into creature, element and terrain, the poem’s closing revelation that she becomes not a single laurel but an entire forest is a thrilling expansion of the subject’s agency.

Runners-up (£100 each)

The four runners-up are presented in alphabetical order by poem title.

Runner-up (£100): Driving ambulances to Ukraine by Alistair Bamford

Poet bio: Alistair Bamford is a publisher, writer, musician and spoken word artist, with experience from the Royal Opera to avant-garde one-man shows. He has two published poetry collections and is currently developing work in longer forms. Website: alistairbamford.com

Head Judge’s Comments: This poem moves with a determined momentum, its striking title opening into an unexpected journey through language, landscape and memory before landing on a beautifully judged final image. The apples, small and green and held up against the names of the dead, become a symbol of endurance and continuity, reminding us that some things ground us even in the long shadow of conflict.

Runner-up (£100): Handover by Jiayi

Poet bio: This poet prefers to publish without a bio.

Head Judge’s Comments: This poem stayed with me long after reading – its power lies, I think, in an understated voice and tone that embodies the kind of loyalty and commitment demanded of the speaker (who we assume is the father, though we never know this). The restraint becomes the emotional engine of the piece. The storytelling is precise and controlled, each economical line doing only what it needs to do, each stanza unfolding over every handover and an almost circular structure that mirrors the custody cycle itself. We return to the same car park, the same motions, the same words that go unsaid, while repetition in the poem mimics habitual rhythms that make the tenderness – and the grief – land beautifully.

Runner-up (£100): Sonata for the Arrival of Housemartins by Sarah Raybould

Poet bio: Sarah Raybould is a Pushcart and Best of the Net nominated poet from the Derbyshire Peak District in the UK. She has poetry and mixed-genre work published with IceFloe Press, Ink Sweat and Tears, Black Bough Poetry, iamb, Arcana Poetry Press, After…amongst others. She is often inspired by the natural world to write about the human experience and explores the dialogue between poetry and art, music, spoken word and film poetry.

Instagram: @raybould_sarah | X: @raybould_drs | Bluesky: @sarahraybould.bsky.social.

Head Judge’s Comments: This experimental poem is exhilarating in the way it plays with musical notation and sonic textures, letting dynamic markings, cues and shifts in timbre become part of its meaning-making. Its formal daring is matched by a surprising emotional clarity: the poem’s sound signature – lightness, buzz, vibrato, crescendo – builds toward a final turn that feels both playful and profound.

Runner-up (£100): Sunday Fuckin Dinner by Barnaby Wick

Poet bio: Barnaby Wick lives in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK. He has been doodling and making up stories and rhymes since he was little and the world made no sense. He’s not much bigger now and the world makes little more sense so he carries on.

Head Judge’s Comments: Sunday Fuckin Dinner delights in the muscular music of dialect, pushing sound to the point where even its repeated curse word becomes pure rhythm rather than anything offensive. Its sound texture and bravado are its strengths: the voice never wavers, the linguistic play is unapologetic and the poem’s sheer commitment to its own sonic world makes it both funny, relatable and ultimately kind-hearted.

Shortlist

Here are the other entries that the Head Judge selected for the shortlist (in alphabetical order by entry title):

• A Boy Dreams of Having Skin by NmaHassan Muhammad
• Aller Lane in Anapaests by Pete Concahsmith
• Bothy by Rae Birchley
• Cotard’s by Jose Buera
• Female Friendships or Muses of the Century by Antares
• He mutes it when I come by Jenny Adlem
• I spit blood into the basin by Emma Dandy
• Jhimli by Tushar Sen
• Littlesea in the gloaming hour by Rae Birchley
• The River’s Wife by Yvette Naden
• The Songpump Awakens by Sian Clarke
• Twenty-Four Weeks by Bethany Ferguson
• Vaslav in Five Positions by Giorgio Grande

Longlist

Here are the entries that were picked for the longlist, with several there were in contention that just missed out on this occasion (in alphabetical order by entry title):

• 17 Questions to Ask a Carnivore by Rosie Copeland
• A Menu for Grieving by Marianne Dugdale
• A New Temple by Cora Crampton
• A No-Holds Bard by Vishvantara
• A SCHMALTZY CALCULATION FOR LOVE IF LOVE IS EQUAL TO INTENTIONALITY by Osadolor Osayande
• ABOUT DREAMING by Robert Terentieff
• After the Cake’s Eaten by Jonathan Greenhause
• After The Rain by Sarah Barke
• American God by Michael Okafor
• An Expansion, Not a Breach by Elizabeth Fevyer
• Avoidant by Roxanne Batty
• Barking Up the Right Tree by Jacquelyn Shah
• Black and White by Vincent Barton
• But Why. by AM Barton
• Diagnosing Lame Lyrics by Cathy Cade
• Dúlamán by Suzanne Victoria Wainwright
• First Year by Natasha Kinsella
• FOREIGN PARTS by Richard Girling
• Good Clay by Bryan Cheong
• House centipede by Piers Haben
• I come from the past by Katey Logan
• Love All by Paris Rosemont
• Mirror (2023-2025) by Ellie Scott
• Only a Hello by S.G. Marziano
• Oracle Room by Mr John Wildsmith
• Riverology by Carol Dalton
• Ruth Ellis is pardoned by a king by Piers Haben
• Sex After Death by Joseph Long
• Sonnet of the patchwork heart by Anna Wheatley
• Taxonomy: Wood Sorrel by Hilary Elder
• The English Rose by Kirsty Hockley
• The Flag’s Slap by Emma Conally-Barklem
• the house by Anna Brook

Thank you to everyone who entered. It has once again been brilliant to read poems sent from all over the world, covering a vast range of themes and styles. An extra thank you to the Head Judge, JLM Morton (who offers various courses as well as poetry mentoring – check out the details HERE).

While you’re here… if you like what we’re doing at NewWriters.org.uk, please consider donating through our Ko-fi.com page. We’ll use any donations to offer more regular free competitions (with bigger prizes) and more free entries to our paid competition to those on low incomes. 

If you’d like to find out about our upcoming writing competitions – both free-to-enter and those with an entry fee, such as the Novel Prize (£1,000 top prize) – as well as writing prompts, book recommendations and more, sign up for our newsletter (we send one each month and will never share your email address or any other information with anyone else).