TERMS & CONDITIONS

Submissions will be open: a) between 21 March–21 May, for release on 21 June; &

b) between 21 September–21 November, for release on 21 December.

Submission periods will close at 23.59 (Australian Eastern Time).

Contributions received outside these windows will not be considered.

Still just a small team, we can only deal with contributions from Australian poets.

Poetry offered cannot be under consideration elsewhere or published previously.

Please take note of dot-point summaries of guidelines alongside submission boxes.

All contributors need to provide a biographical statement, up to 50 words in length.

Yet offer only one bio statement per edition, please, in the submission process itself.

Soon after a submission period closes, poets will be advised about acceptances.

Work selected by us should not be shared on social media prior to our release date.

Poets retain the ownership of copyright for poems appearing within this journal.

If work is re-published later (e.g. in book form), Catchment should be acknowledged.

We may choose writing selected here for further initiatives, e.g. Catchment Voices.

(Updated Sept 2025)

OTHER GENERAL GUIDELINES

(Updated for Edition 5 Sept 2025)

Longer poems & tanka (in Eng) can be submitted, at one time, focussed on location.

Place can be explored differently: scenic beauty; emotive memory; personal status…

A brief note can be included below poems in either style to give a sense of locality.

The name by which a spot is known could be built into a longer poem or a tanka too.

Poetry need not identify a place, though – it may explore locations outside Australia.

Brief notes can define vocabulary/ translate terms/ recognise influences or contexts.

You may ask for text to be shaped (e.g. symmetrically/ with larger gaps inside a line).

Requests for unusual layout/ formatting must appear in clear notes within text boxes.

If asking for such, remember that our digital set-up removes your own programming.

So you need to state it plainly, in a note, if you want italics (say) at the end of line 3.

If all you say is ‘I’d like it set out like this,’ remember we can’t see what that shape is.

Efforts will be made to meet such requests, if practicable, given restraints we face.

Yet notes should not explain the message in a poem: let meaning speak for itself…

Poetry offered has to be your own original work, neither plagiarised nor aided by AI.

But work by other writers may be used as inspiration, as long as you credit sources.

BIOGRAPHICAL STATEMENTS

In 50 words or less, please give details about achievements in writing/ publications.

Start with your full name (e.g. Ann Bell), using the 3rd person (she/ he/ they; not I).

Given our focus on poetry of place, writers can offer a sense of their own location.

Contributors are encouraged to acknowledge traditional owners of country.

Bio statements may include a sense of your working life/ other involvements.

Even if you have submitted before, please do send a new statement, yet only once.

LONGER POETRY

Three (3) longer poems can be offered at one time, each in a different text box.

Any single longer contribution should not be greater than thirty (30) lines in length.

All such work needs to operate in a stand-alone way, yet can have multiple parts.

A maximum of two (2) lengthier pieces will be selected per contributor per edition.

Titles are essential with all longer work: these won’t be considered in the line-count.

Writers’ names & titles given in submission boxes will appear above poems chosen.

So please give only the text of poems offered in larger text boxes (plus any notes).

Dedications may be added below the title, not being considered among the 30 lines.

Spaces left blank below titles/ between stanzas/ sections likewise won’t be counted.

Valuing variety/ experiment, we’re drawn to poetry of place with a modern approach.

Free verse & Western set-forms are welcome, if not heavy rhyming: no bush ballads.

Please do NOT submit haibun, as if it is longer poetry: instead, it is prose with haiku.

TANKA

All tanka offered in a submission must be copied into the one larger text box given.

Poets may contribute up to (5) stand-alone tanka, each being five (5) lines in length.

Using that same box, a sequence/ string of four (4) tanka can be submitted instead.

No title should precede a stand-alone tanka, yet one must be given before a string.

A sub-title can be included, stating it’s a sequence; even giving a sense of place too.

A maximum of four (4) tanka (stand-alone/ in a string) will be chosen per contributor.

Poets should aim to show a grasp of approaches used in English Language tanka.

Western poetic strategies like explicit similes/ full rhyming should not be employed.

Please avoid tanka made up by swathes of full verbs or lists of unconnected images.

Following a shorter-longer-shorter-longer-longer pattern – in line-length – can help.

Yet you need NOT adopt a strict 5-7-5-7-7 syllabic count: no extras as ‘fillers’ please.

Tanka may work as one sentence, yet having two stages often feels more effective.

These can be punctuated with a dash/ ellipsis at the end of any of the first four lines.

If used at all, a full verb could appear in one part, with a participle (…ing) in the other.

A break might offer a link-and-shift (e.g. between the natural world & human nature).
 
Less is best: with Japanese forms, readers have been seen as completing the poem.
 
Tanka show feelings – implying similarities/ differences can let your reader wonder…
 
We admire tanka built on reaction: losses prompting tears; oddities bringing smiles.