Frances Jaffer Book Award :  The Frances Jaffer Book Award for a first book of poetry that is experimental in spirit and practice was established in 1999 in honor of Bay Area poet and editor, Frances Jaffer (1921-1999).  The winning selection is published by Kelsey Street Press.

Selection Process. 
KSP receives manuscripts that have been nominated by writers working in a range of exploratory styles and living in diverse parts of the United States. The judge remains anonymous until the selection is final. we are currently not accepting submissions for this award, but please stay tuned for future announcements.

Winners

Winner, 2003
Occupied by Carol Mirakove
Mei-mei Berssenbrugge, this year's judge, writes: "Occupied is porous to life, a life Mirakove expresses with a strict beauty of witness, of demand."

Winner, 2001
CUSP by Jocelyn Saidenberg
Barbara Guest who selected the book writes: "CUSP is a poem of exceptional sensibility and ardor."

Winner, 2000
Unknowne Land by Eléna Rivera
was nominated by Myung Mi Kim and selected by Kathleen Fraser, the first judge of the series. Of her choice, Fraser writes: the book "is a brilliant, mature, deeply engaging work, whose Question is constructed through its unfolding shape. . . .Rivera's writing is contemplative and thickly quiet, then bell-clear."