Sydney Mayes

Biography

Sydney Mayes is the 2026 FSG Fellow, winner of the 2025 Adrienne Rich Award and the inaugural Poet of the Year Award from ONLY POEMS. Her poems have been published in The Atlantic, Poets.org, Prairie Schooner, and The Kenyon Review, among others.

See Work

POETRY / Winter 2025

The Poet Visits the Denver Public Library with Their Beloved

By Sydney Mayes

It is their idea to peruse the maps—
the cuff of their sweater, rocktrumpet

pink, not warm from Denver’s summer-acting 
winter, but my wrist chaffing against theirs.

POETRY / Winter 2025

Golden Glosa Recalling Dearfield’s First Year

By Sydney Mayes

For the first year, living off the heat of sagebrush, these 
were the things that kept us going: our faces as they are 
or were, hog black and shining, turned to 
bask in the slough of May crisp moonlight

POETRY / Winter 2025

Excerpts from Minerva’s Sonnets

By Sydney Mayes