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FLASH SALE! 33% off all recent ISSUES

POETRY submissions REopen DECEMBER 15

Shō Poetry Journal

Established in 2002, revived in 2023

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Shō Poetry Journal is a nonprofit print journal emerging from a 20-year hibernation. We publish an eclectic range of poetry twice a year and publish audio features on a rolling basis. We strive to champion voices that have been historically underrepresented or overlooked. Browse a list of our contributors and follow us on Instagram for updates.

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A girl in a long white dress and a bird head mask sits on a bough under a full moon in a night forest landscape. Her hands are folded in her lap and her feet can't be seen. Text says: Shō Poetry Journal No. 7 Summer 2025.

CURRENT ISSUE

Shō No. 7

SUMMER 2025

This issue features 67 poems by 48 poets, including:

– Christian J. Collier (Winner, Shō Poetry Prize)
– Aldo Amparán (Shō Poetry Prize Runner-Up)
– Ohia, Ernest Chigaemezu (Winner, Sita Martin Prize)
– Nina C. Peláez (Sita Martin Prize Runner-Up)

Cover art: “Interim” by Tanya Rastogi.

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Online Features

  • Nov 1, 2025

    Native American Heritage Month 2025

  • Oct 30, 2025

    Shō Poetry Journal Family

  • Oct 30, 2025

    Audio Feature: Saddiq Dzukogi

  • Oct 30, 2025

    A Conversation with Arah Ko

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Past Issues

Shō No. 6

Winter 2024/2025

Shō No. 6 features 57 poems by 40 poets.

Cover art: “In Gilded Walls” by Tanya Rastogi.

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Shō No. 5

Summer 2024

Shō No. 5 features 68 poems by 47 poets.

Cover art: “Lucy” by Harim Choi.

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Shō No. 4

Winter 2023/2024

Illustration of girl wearing a large deer head mask with antlers. She is clothed in a dark blue tshirt and pants and stands in a high desert landscape, holding plastic flowers. A ghostly girl’s head is placed beside her in the grass.

Shō No. 4 features 73 poems by 47 poets.

Cover art: “Girl with Deer Mask” by Harim Choi.

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Shō No. 3

Summer/Fall 2023

Shō No. 3 features 62 poems by 42 poets.

Cover art: “Grandfather Autumn” by Juanita Violini.

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Shō Poetry Journal on Instagram

shopoetryjournal

Quick coffee stop @mutinytrinidad before we head t Quick coffee stop @mutinytrinidad before we head to the post office to mail out nominations⏳

#pushcartprize
Our final feature for Native American Heritage Mon Our final feature for Native American Heritage Month is “LEST WE FORGET THAT NATURE IS NOT OUR FRIEND” by J.K. Tsosie (@jktsosie).

Of this poem, J.K. Tsosie says: “I was always taught that nature was never our kin, it was never our equal. It has always reigned above us. Thus, the poem is a prayer of sorts...”

Read and listen to the full poem and read more about the title and the poem on our website at tinyurl.com/shonahm25
Congratulations to Elizabeth Loudon, whose poem “R Congratulations to Elizabeth Loudon, whose poem “Renunciation” was chosen for inclusion in Best New Poets 2025 and will be in our winter issue, Shō No. 8!

Elizabeth Loudon is a poet and novelist. Her debut novel, A Stranger In Baghdad (AUC Hoopoe, 2023), won the Sharjah International Book Festival award for best international fiction. Her poetry and prose have appeared in numerous journals, including North American Review, Amsterdam Review, Columbia Review, One Art Poetry, and Southword. After 25 years in Massachusetts, she returned to her native England, where she spends as much time as possible outside.

#bestnewpoets
M. Cynthia Cheung’s debut collection “Common Disas M. Cynthia Cheung’s debut collection “Common Disaster” was released on November 15 and is available for purchase @acrebooks (tinyurl.com/commondisaster). Listen to a poem from the collection, “Ensenada,” which was published in Shō No. 7 (Summer 2025).

About the poem: I wrote "Ensenada" after an occurrence that happened almost exactly as depicted in the poem. It’s the last poem I wrote for my debut collection and probably one of my favorites.

About “Common Disaster”: As a front-line physician, M. Cynthia Cheung started writing poetry during the worst days of the COVID-19 pandemic. Her remarkable debut collection, “Common Disaster,” chronicles these experiences. Confronting not just the coronavirus but also war crimes and the death of loved ones, Cheung shows us that the pandemic is only one of many disasters we hold in common. In poems that look to both the past and future, she takes a stand against the extinction of self and memory, challenging the violence of erasure.

The period covered by the book is geologic and vast. It examines present-day evidence of ancient human activity and natural history, including the Lascaux caves, asteroid craters, tar pits, and Viking ruins. The poems include ghazals, thoughtful free verse, and work that takes up the page in reframing classical Chinese oracular texts to situate the pain of a doctor in crisis.

As a physician-poet, Cheung asks us to see beyond the everyday to the devastating truths about the human condition.

M. Cynthia Cheung (@zoologicalgirl) is an American poet whose work has appeared in AGNI, Gulf Coast, Pleiades, swamp pink, and elsewhere, and she is the recipient of the Robert H. Winner Memorial Award from the Poetry Society of America. She practices internal medicine in Texas.
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Publishing Stats

Since our revival issue was published in Summer 2023:

327

Poems Published

224

Total Poets Published

98

Audio Features Published

42

Poems Nominated for Prizes

2

Poems chosen for inclusion in Best Spiritual Literature

Shō Poetry Journal


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