Christopher Nelson, the publisher and editor of Green Linden Press, believes “poetry is the most fluid literary art.” He adds, “In its shape, it can be formal or free; in its tones and diction it can be arch or demotic; and it flourishes as text on a page or a voice in the air.” At Green Linden Press, Nelson says, “we love it in every mode, every manifestation—when done well.” Based in Grinnell, Iowa, Green Linden Press began in 2008 as a poetry blog, Under a Warm Green Linden, which initially published only interviews—though the online archive now includes more than a hundred interviews and reviews, with conversations featuring Carolyn Forché, Fady Joudah, and Monica Ong, among others. Over the years the press added a digital poetry journal and broadside series. In 2018, Green Linden Press was officially established as a nonprofit publisher of books and pamphlets with a green mission to support reforestation.
The press, which publishes about six titles per year, donates a portion of its proceeds to environmental efforts and has planted nine hundred trees to date. Submissions are open through November for Green Linden’s annual Wishing Jewel Prize, which awards $1,000 and publication for an innovative book-length manuscript of poetry “that challenges expectations of what a book of poems can be.” Also open through November are submissions to the Stephen Mitchell Prize for excellence in translation, which awards $1,000 and publication for a book-length manuscript in any genre translated into English. Both contests charge a $25 reading fee, though there is a 50 percent discount for students and writers facing economic difficulty. The open reading period for poetry chapbooks will run from December 1, 2025, through March 21, 2026. Nelson says that being a small operation makes Green Linden “nimble and able to take risks.” Recent titles include the poetry collections Passport (2025) by Richard Jones and American Graphic (2024) by JoAnne McFarland. Green Linden will launch an imprint called Salon des Refusés in early 2027. “Borrowing the name of the 1863 exhibition of artists rejected from the Paris Salon—a group that included such luminaries as Manet, Pissarro, and Whistler—Salon des Refusés will champion projects that foreground innovation and beauty,” Nelson says, “regardless of the expectations of the marketplace.”
