The Tom Lee Poetry and Spoken Word Contest is an annual contest honoring outstanding poetry and spoken word inspired by Tom Lee's qualities of courage, generosity and humanity.
Rules and Eligibility
- Open to students between 9th and 12th grade attending any high-school located in Shelby County, TN
- Only one entry may be submitted per person
- Both poem and spoken word entries must be no more than 40 lines
- No entry may have been previously published
- Writing about Tom Lee is not required, but special attention will be given to poems that engage with the themes of courage, generosity, selflessness and humanity
Winners will be announced and honored on or near May 8 -- the anniversary of Tom Lee's heroic river rescue. The contest judge for is award-winning, widely published poet and professor at University of Memphis, Marcus Wicker.