The Tony Quagliano Poetry Award

This award honors Tony Quagliano’s legacy as an experimental poet and editor. It recognizes an accomplished poet with an outstanding body of innovative, cutting-edge work pushing the boundaries of poetic craft, such as experimental approaches to form and/or language. This award also recognizes a poet who contributes meaningfully to a literary community. Preference is given to poets with connection to Hawai‘i and/or the Pacific.

The biennial Tony Quagliano Poetry Award is for $1,000.

This award is established in partnership with the Hawaiʻi Council for the Humanities. The winner is featured on the Hawaiʻi Council for the Humanities website and invited to give a poetry reading and workshop with Hawaiʻi Council for the Humanities within six months of receiving notification of the award.

Applications will be reviewed by a judge or a panel of judges.

Meet this year’s award winner, Lehua M. Taitano!

Eligibility and Application:

• There is no entry fee.
• Applicants must be a resident of a US state or territory.
• Submissions must be in English.
• Applicants will be judged 75% on quality of published work and 25% on literary community involvement.
• Applications for the 2027-28 award are anticipated to open at the end of 2026.

Poets must submit 3 PDF files as described below:

• 20 pages of published or unpublished poetry (please do not include the name of the poet on any of these pages)
• A statement explaining the applicant’s work to build and strengthen a literary community (i.e., working with local community literary organizations, supporting other writers as a publisher/editor, organizing literary events, teaching or giving workshops in the community, advocating for underserved communities). The applicant’s name should not be included in this statement.
• To establish eligibility the applicant must submit a bibliography of at least 25 poems that have been published in journals, anthologies, chapbooks, or books (print or online).

♦ The citations should include the title and date of each source publication.
♦ No more than 5 poems should be from any one source.
♦ The heading for this bibliography should provide:

◊ Name
◊ Address
◊ Phone number
◊ Email address of the poet.

Submissions are by email: TQpoetryaward@hihumanities.org
Please email any inquiries to TQpoetryaward@hihumanities.org or lruby@hawaii.edu.

For more information, visit the Tony Quagliano Poetry site.