Established in 2007 and supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation, the Overland Judith Wright Poetry Prize seeks outstanding poetry from new and emerging writers.

This year’s judges, Shastra Deo, Harry Reid and Andrew Sutherland, read more than 800 entries before selecting a shortlist of eight poems. The judges then chose three outstanding poems to place first, second and third in this year’s prize. Look out for these poems when they are published in Overland later this year.

Overland, the judges and the Malcolm Robertson Foundation are thrilled to announce the final results of the 2025 Judith Wright Poetry Prize. Congratulations to the following poets!

First place ($6000)

Mia Thom

‘go raging’

‘go raging’ distills personal moments of reckoning with ongoing ontological homelessness perpetrated by colonial powers.

Mia Thom is a queer Bundjalung writer moving between Arakwal and Wurundjeri Country.

Second place ($2000)

Linda Judge

‘Cooking Lessons’

This is an ode to my neighbour Attilio. He taught me so much. About what to do and what not to do and how cooking depends on the ingredients.

Linda Judge is a visual artist who writes. She has had stories published in Meanjin, gargouille and unusual work and has been a contributor to Imprint magazine. She has contributed a chapter to Care Ethics and Art published by Routledge and has had poetry published in WV magazine, unusual work and Rabbit. In 2021 she won the Christos prize for her poem ‘Jurmala’ and the Keith Carroll Award for the second consecutive year. In 2024 she was a runner up in the Geelong local word poetry prize for her submitted poem marketplace. She has been runner up in the Deborah Cass award and highly commended for the Grace Marion Wilson emerging writers prize as well as being long listed in the Fish prize for memoir.

Third place ($1000)

Isabella G Mead

‘On the future distribution of fruit bats’

I am very fortunate to live near a large bat colony; ‘On the future distribution of fruit bats’ imagines a day when they depart for lutruwita’s cooler climes.

Isabella G Mead’s debut poetry collection, The Infant Vine, was published in 2024 by UWAP and shortlisted for the Judith Wright Calanthe Award for a Poetry Collection (2025). She lives, writes and raises her children on unceded Wurundjeri land.

The Judith Wright Poetry Prize is supported by the Malcolm Robertson Foundation