Nominations and Awards
Infinite Baffle: A Poetic Memoir, Honorable Mention in the Miami Book Fair Emerging Writer Awards 2025
“Brothers Water,” Honorable Mention in the 2026 Plentitudes Prize for Nonfiction
Rosa Sophia Godshall was awarded the 2023 Christopher F. Kelly Award for Poetry from the Academy of American Poets for “Villanelle at 37,” “World Beast,” and “Reminders from the Senior Tech to the Apprentice Mechanic on Her First Day.”
Rosa Sophia Godshall’s short essays, “They Call Me Buzz Jackson,” “When Our Engine Died,” and “Miles,” were finalists in Bellingham Review’s 2021 Annie Dillard Award for Creative Nonfiction.
“Miles” was also a semifinalist in the Sandy Crimmins National Prize for Poetry. “When Our Engine Died” was a finalist in Columbia Journal’s Online Nonfiction Contest.
Her Poem “Why I Need My Lover to Be Careful” was a finalist in the Foundry Prize for Poetry.
“Infinite Baffle” was a finalist in the 2022 CRAFT Hybrid Writing Contest.
“Take This Transmission for Instance” was awarded Runner-Up in the 2020 Florida International University Student Literary Awards, judged by poet Jan Beatty. Published in Philadelphia Stories magazine.
Praise and Awards
Praise for “Villanelle at 37,” “World Beast,” and “Reminders from the Senior Tech to the Apprentice Mechanic on Her First Day” from poet Catherine Bowman, judge in the 2023 FIU Student Literary Awards
In an exquisite and stunning sequence, the sonnet serves as a world beast, the villanelle an abiding altar, a poem of apprenticeship, a kind of ars poetica. Fueled by a music that is both sorrowful and celebratory, these poems guide us through lush, labyrinthine realms of ancestry, memory, bejeweled gooseberries, mechanic tricks, in-between spaces and sacred spaces with a sumptuous and heartbreaking attention to the world and word.
Praise for “Take This Transmission for Instance” from poet Jan Beatty, judge in the 2020 FIU Student Literary Awards
The emotional depth of ‘Take This Transmission for Instance’ that is embodied in the story of the transmission is admirable. The strong sense of detail supports this sense of loss and regret in a very moving way. As the poem continues, the voice only grows stronger into a beautiful love poem.
Poetry Publications
“Automotive Poetry” and “World Beast,” Rawhead Journal, Spring 2026
“Schematic of a Marriage,” Permafrost Magazine, 2026
“Mama Remembers,” Sobotka Literary Magazine, 2026
“Poem in Which I Learn to Forgive,” Sheila-Na-Gig, Inc. Poetry Journal, Vol. 9.3, Spring 2025
“Someone Once Told Me We’re All Lopsided,” Moss Puppy Magazine, November 2024
“Break Time at Lincoln Tech Automotive School in Mangonia Park, Florida,” SoFloPoJo, August 1, 2024.
“Rising Water,” SWWIM Every day, Supporting Women Writers in Miami, April 18, 2024
“Braids,” The Closed Eye Open, page 48, Issue XI, Spring 2024
“Villanelle at 37,” Sentience Literary Journal, Fall/Winter 2023, Vol. 2, Issue 3 – Gardens
“Clutch,” SWWIM Every day, Supporting Women Writers in Miami, June 28, 2023
“Miles,” Thimble Literary Magazine, Vol. 6. No 1., Summer 2023
“Night School Sonnet,” Limp Wrist, Issue #5
“Why I Need My Lover to Be Careful,” Writer’s Foundry Review, Issue 2, Spring 2023
Creative Nonfiction Publications
“What is My Aim? Right Action on the Spiritual Path,” The Theosophist, Vol. 146.7, April 2025
“Stage Four,” riverSedge: A Journal of Art and Literature, Winner of the riverSedge Prose Contest, Issue 38, 2025
“Claw of an Unnamed Animal,” Rathalla Review, Spring 2025
“Walking Prayer,” South Dakota Review, Vol. 60, No. 2, Spring 2026
“Tell Me, Tortoise,” Saw Palm, Vol. 20, Spring 2026
“The Flea Market,” Quarter After Eight, Spring 2026; Finalist in SLAB Literary 2026 Boggs Contest
“On the Battlefield in Jupiter,” Islandia Journal, Issue #3
“Five Strategies for Coping: Advice to Young Patients Entering College,” FPA Quarterly of the Facial Pain Association, Spring 2022: In 2022, I was one of the recipients of the Facial Pain Resiliency Academic Scholarship, and my winning essay was published in the Spring 2022 issue of FPA Quarterly.
Published Interviews
“Hybridity in Indigenous Writing: An Interview with Poet Elgin Jumper,” Gulf Stream Literary Magazine, Spring 2023.
“The Hybrid Forms Club: An Eight-Spoked Collaborative Interview,” Tinder Box Poetry Journal
Books by Rosa Sophia Godshall
Village of North Palm Beach: A History (Arcadia Publishing) is the history of the Village of North Palm Beach in northern Palm Beach County. Available now.
Overdue in Paradise: The Library History of Palm Beach County (Palmango Press) is a collection of essays about Palm Beach County library history, including an essay by Rosa Sophia on the history of the North Palm Beach Public Library.
Meet Me in the Garden is a standalone romance novel set in South Florida (Limitless Publishing, 2015).
The House Guest is a paranormal mystery set in rural Pennsylvania (Limitless Publishing, 2015).
Over the Ivy Wall and Orion Cross My Sky are part of the Clearwater Romance Series (Sunshine Press). They follow the lives of four young people in Clearwater, Wyoming as they seek stability despite their traumatic pasts.
Sphere of Influence: An Approach to Self-Defense by M.D. Holden (Lady June Press) is a collection of the martial arts writings of Rosa’s brother, Miles, who took his own life in August 2015.
Praise for Sphere of Influence
This book reads like someone who has been doing this for several decades. It is very technical and sophisticated material. His passion for the arts shined through in each chapter that I read.
— Grandmaster Isaiah Gathings, author of The Book of Six Tenets: Martial Arts and Life and Instructor at The Academy of Soo Do Thai