2026 Peter Porter Poetry Prize

The longlist for the 2026 Peter Porter Poetry Prize has been announced

Australian Book Review is delighted to announce the longlist for the 2026 Peter Porter Poetry Prize. The prize was judged by Judith Bishop, Felicity Plunkett, and Anders Villani. The shortlisted poems will appear in the January-February 2026 issue. Now in its twenty-second year, the Porter Prize is one of Australia’s most lucrative and respected poetry awards. It honours the life and work of the great Australian poet Peter Porter (1929–2010), a contributor to ABR for many years.

Status: Closed

First prize: AU$6,000

Four other shortlisted poets: AU$1,000

Dates: Opened 7 July and closed 13 October 2025

Judges: Judith Bishop, Felicity Plunkett, and Anders Villani

More information

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The Peter Porter Poetry Prize is funded by the ABR Patrons, including support in memory of Kate Boyce.

The longlist for the 2026 Peter Porter Poetry Prize is as follows (in alphabetical order by author surname):

J Andros (United States)
Jamil Badi (Vic.)
Daragh Byrne (NSW)
Elena Croitoru-Reed (United Kingdom)
Ross Gillett (Vic.)
Lisa Gluskin Stonestreet (United States)
Lily Holloway (New Zealand)
Kirsten Krauth (Vic.)
Cheryl Leavy (QLD)
Damen O’Brien (QLD)
Claire Potter (NSW)
Dominic Symes (Vic.)

The 2026 Peter Porter Poetry Prize longlist 

J Andros

J Andros (they/he) writes to find a more freeing form of communication. Originally from Washington DC, he was exposed early to protests and continues to work from New York City or the San Francisco Bay Area. His writing has been featured on radio shows, in short films, in anthologies, and on stages around the world. J Andros co-founded the poetry publication Poets Reading the News and has taught and studied creative writing at NYU and other institutions. You can find more of their work at www.jandros.work or on social media @nycdownglo. 

Jamil Badi

Jamil Badi is a writer living on unceded Wurundjeri land. Inspired by oral storytelling practices, his work primarily consists of folktales which aim to blend the properties of the spoken word with the written. His fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction has appeared in Meanjin, Overland, Island, Cordite, Voiceworks, and elsewhere. He is a recipient of the 2026 Next Chapter Fellowship.

Daragh Byrne

Daragh Byrne is a Sydney-based Irish poet. His work has appeared in Southword, Poetry Wales, Poetry Birmingham Literary Review, Banshee, Howl New Irish Writing, Cyphers, Crannóg, The Waxed Lemon, The Four Faced Liar, Stony Thursday Book, and elsewhere. He has been shortlisted or commended in the Patrick Kavanagh Award, Fool for Poetry International Chapbook Competition, Poetry London competitions (pamphlet and single poem), and the Listowel Writer’s Week Collection Competition. He is founding editor of The Marrow, a journal of international poetry.  https://themarrowpoetry.com

Elena Croitoru-Reed

Elena Croitoru-Reed has a Masters in Creative Writing from the University of Cambridge. She has won the Charles Causley Poetry Prize, the South Bank Poetry Prize, and was commended in the National Poetry Competition. She has also placed or was a finalist in the Montreal Poetry Prize, Bridport Prize, and other awards. Her first poetry pamphlet won the Live Canon Pamphlet Prize. Her work is forthcoming or has appeared in POETRY, World Literature Today, and The Poetry Society, among others.

Ross Gillett

Ross Gillett’s books The Mirror Hurlers (2019) and Swimmer in the Dust (2022) are available from Puncher and Wattmann. He has won a number of Australian awards, including the Newcastle Poetry Prize.

Lisa Gluskin Stonestreet

Lisa Gluskin Stonestreet is the author of The Greenhouse (2014), which was awarded the Frost Place Prize, and Tulips, Water, Ash (2009), which was awarded the Morse Poetry Prize). Her poems have appeared in journals including Plume, Boulevard, Beloit Poetry Journal, and Kenyon Review, as well as in multiple anthologies. She lives in northern California, where she reads, writes, edits, teaches writing, and with writers in her backyard Poetry Shack. lisagluskinstonestreet.com

Lily Holloway

Lily Holloway is a powerlifting enthusiast and a recent graduate of the Syracuse University Creative Writing MFA. This year, they won The Joyce Carol Oates Award in Poetry for the best group of poems by a graduate student at Syracuse University as well as The Joyce Carol Oates Award in Fiction for best story. They are a 2024 winner of the Griffith Review Emerging Voices competition and placed second in the 2024 Black Warrior Review Poetry Competition. Their work is published or forthcoming in various publications, including Black Warrior Review, Sundog Lit, Ōrongohau | Best New Zealand Poems, Peach Mag, and Hobart After Dark. Their chapbook was published in 2021 as a part of Auckland University Press’s AUP New Poets 8. Find them on X and Instagram.

Kirsten Krauth

Kirsten Krauth is an author, podcaster, editor, and poet. Her latest novel, Almost a Mirror, was shortlisted for the Penguin Literary Prize and SPN Book of the Year and recognised by The Guardian as one of the Best Australian Books of 2020, sparking a podcast and live show. Her poem, ‘Pencils from Heaven’, was runner up in the Blake Poetry Prize and her first book of poetry, Beautiful Avalanche, will be published by Life Before Man in 2027.

Cheryl Leavy

Cheryl Leavy is an award-winning writer from the Kooma Nation who is passionate about language revitalisation. Writing in both English and her critically endangered Kooma language, she has been published by Cordite, Griffith Review, Southerly, The Guardian, and in the University of Queensland Press anthology, Words to Sing the World Alive. In 2022, Cheryl won the Oodgeroo Noonuccal Prize for Indigenous Poetry. She has recently completed her first poetry collection, titled Mudhunda – The Song Country, to be published in 2027. Cheryl’s dèbut bilingual picture book, Yanga Mother, was shortlisted for an Australian Book Industry Award and a Queensland Literary Award for a Work of State Significance.

Damen O’Brien

Damen O’Brien is a multi-award-winning Brisbane-based poet. His prizes include The Moth Poetry Prize, the 2017 Peter Porter Poetry Prize, and the New Millennium Writings Award.  His poems can be found in New Ohio Review, Aesthetica Magazine, Arc Poetry Journal, Mississippi Review, and other journals. Damen’s latest book is Walking the Boundary (Pitt Street Poetry, 2024).

Claire Potter

Claire Potter is author of four poetry collections, Acanthus (Giramondo, 2022), Swallow (Five Islands, 2010), N’ombre (Vagabond, 2007), and In Front of a Comma (Poets Union, 2006), as well as numerous essays and translations. She lives between Sydney and London, where she is Head of the Writing Centre at the Architectural Association.

Dominic Symes

Dominic Symes lives on the unceded lands of the Wurundjeri people of the Kulin Nation. His début collection, I saw the best memes of my generation (Recent Work Press, 2022) was highly commended in the 2024 NSW Premier’s Literary Awards. In 2025 he was shortlisted for the Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize and became a father for the first time. His second collection, songs of love & hate speech, is forthcoming with Rabbit in 2026.