Anna poet receives honors in dozen national competitions

Kathy Lohrum Cotton of Anna recently received awards in a dozen national poetry competitions. 

Winners from nearly 7,000 submissions were announced at the recent 2019 National Federation of State Poetry Societies, NFSPS, convention in Santa Fe, N.M.

Five poems earned cash prizes for second-place wins in the Illinois State Poetry Society Award, Donald Stodghill Memorial Award, Poetry Society of Texas Award, Prouty Memorial Award and Ohio Award. The poems have been published in the Encore 2019 Prize Poems anthology.

Cotton’s poems also took seven honorable mentions for the Mildred Vorpahl Baass Remembrance Award, William Stafford Memorial Award, Louisiana State Poetry Society Award, Claire Van Breeman Downes Memorial Award, Massachusetts State Poetry Society Award, Margo Award and Alabama State Poetry Society Award.

Cotton is a member of the Illinois State Poetry Society board of directors and ISPS facilitator of the Southern Chapter in Carbondale. 

Cotton also a member of the NFSPS board of directors. She serves as editor for the national organization’s annual poetry anthology.