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Arlington County is accepting applications for its 2025-2027 poet laureate, a two-year appointment focused on expanding the community’s engagement with poetry and the literary arts.
Applications are due by 5 p.m. June 2, 2025. The selected poet’s contract will begin after July 1 to align with the county’s fiscal year.
The poet laureate will receive a $1,500 annual honorarium, plus as much as $500 per year for approved materials and costs related to community programs. The appointee will work as an independent contractor and be recognized at a public ceremony, with their name added to the Poets Laureate plaque at Courthouse Plaza.
Applicants must be at least 18, live in Arlington when applying and remain county residents throughout the appointment. They must also have experience publishing or presenting original poetry in journals, magazines, websites or programs.
County employees and members of Arlington boards and commissions are ineligible. Former county poets laureate may apply again after spending one complete term out of office.
Arlington Cultural Affairs staff will screen submissions for eligibility. A panel of staff members, literary professionals and respected regional poets will then review qualified candidates, who may be interviewed before the final selection.
The new laureate will write at least two original poems each year based on mutually agreed themes supporting County Board priorities. Those works will be presented at public readings, potentially during events such as Arlington’s Martin Luther King Jr. celebration, Juneteenth observance, 9/11 memorial service or Columbia Pike Blues Festival.
Other duties include judging the annual Moving Words Poetry Competition, contributing one poem each year for display on Arlington Transit buses and leading public programs with Arlington Public Libraries and Cultural Affairs. Workshops, readings and student events are among the possible activities.
Poems created for the county will remain the poet’s property, although Arlington will retain the right to use them. Later publications must identify any such poem as an original work written for Arlington County.
The program is administered by the Division of Cultural Affairs within Arlington Economic Development. Cultural Affairs Director Michelle Isabelle-Stark said changing language and social media have made poetry easier to create and share, adding that the next laureate will help “awaken the poet in all of us.”
The appointment follows the terms of inaugural laureate Katherine E. Young, who served from 2016 to 2018, Holly Karapetkova, who served from 2020 to 2023, and current laureate Courtney LeBlanc.
Arlington’s broader literary initiatives include the Moving Words competition, now in its 26th year, which replaces advertisements inside county buses with poems by local writers. During National Poetry Month, “The Poet is IN” pop-up booths also bring poets to libraries, festivals and other activities to create free personalized poems for visitors.
The announced timeline calls for interviews in mid-May, applications to close June 2 and the contract to begin after July 1.