How to Submit Your<br > Poetry Successfully<br > BY CHANTELLE BENTLEY<br > If you re a beginning poet who has yet to submit work or a veteran poet who needs a refresher<br > course on submission procedures， this article provides the basic information you ll need to<br > successfully submit your poetry fur pubhcation.<br > Before we begin discussing how to prepare poems for submission， however， determine where<br > you want to send your work. The "Quick-Start" Guide to Publishing Your Poetry， on page 2，<br > provides beginning poets with ways to determine if their poetry is ready for submission and<br > ideas on how to locate suitable markets. Experienced poets should utilize tiie six indexes at the<br > back of this book or go straight to the listings to find their most promising markets. In either<br > situation， our new Openness to Submissions Index， which lists magazines， presses and contests<br > according to their openness to unsolicited manuscripts， will make your search for markets easier<br > by quickly identifying those markets who are open to beginners and those markets who want<br > only experienced poets.<br > Once you ve decided where to send your work， you can then focus on proper presentation. In<br > the following pages， you will find specifics about approaching magazines and presses， formatting<br > poetry manuscripts， selling the rights to your work and preparing cover letters. You ll also find<br > suggestions about what to do if you don t receive a reply from an editor about work submitted.<br > Reading and following these guidelines should help you decrease the occurrence of common<br > submission mistakes as well as increase the number of acceptance letters flowing into your<br > mailbox.<br > ~l~aching magazine markets<br > ~f you are submitting work to a quarterly newsletter， an online magazine or an annual poetry<br > ~olmaal， poetry editors are primarily interested in seeing how you write. Therefore， a query letter<br > isltat aecmssary， but a sample of your work is. Usually three to five poems with a cover letter<br > *elf.addressed stamped envelope (SASE) is preferred by most editors.<br > OJ~sionalty， editors will require poets to submit in a manner other than the traditional method<br > .JlISI memioned， Because of this， Poet s Market s Publishers of Poetry section provides the most<br > ~entlal submissinn information in its listings. Also， it s a good idea to obtain writer s guidelines<br > ~by sendinge SASEJor visiting a magazine s website prior to submitting.<br > .~a.geeecal， agartt~ ~are not needed to submit poetry to magazines. Most agents do not handle<br > lloetry4~r~e it simply does not pay. (It s hard for an agent to earn commission when a poet is<br > ~p~d~ emltribator s oopies.) And because the majority of book publishers who accept unsolicited<br > ~ ~re ~ ~preseas--.paying a small honorarium or a percentage of the print run--poets<br > ~a~ also best to l~tdle ~heir own book submissions， too.<br > -Appro~ag book publishers<br > W~hell Jttbmitt~g a fell-length poetry manuscript for possible publication， most editors want<br > to~t~oeoei~~e~query with a few sample poems and a cover letter with brief bio and publication<br > .~yt~.~Iow~~t， there *tr~ those editors who prefer to receive the complete manuscript， espe-<br > "ff~&~ editor ，pttblisbes chapbooks and not full-length collections. (See the discussion of<br > ~. ~p~kgt*blisht~g on page 15 of this article.)<br >