It’s exciting to read about gods and goddesses and heroes and heroines and then to recognise them popping up in other books and stories. We want to create a book which both references and retells traditional stories in lively and engaging ways, like a key to the primary reference points of literature and a passport to the joy of storytelling.

We’d like to find poems which tell myths and legends in fresh, engaging (not necessarily innovative) ways, as well as poems which give new spins to old stories and characters. So, there could be a poem which tells the story of how Prometheus stole fire, or a poem about Baba Yaga having a cup of tea in her chicken-legged hut, or a poem where Anansi meets Loki. There could be a poem about the origin of selkies, or Quetzalcoatl’s feathers, or about maidens who danced on a Sunday but whose dancing was so bad they didn’t warrant petrification. We want the whole book to convey the fun and joy of traditional storytelling, and to suggest the endless possibility for invention and reinvention.

This book will be aimed at children aged 6-10 years old. We’re imagining that some poems could be read to children as young as 4, who can read the poems by themselves by the age of 6 and continue to discover new meanings as they get older. If we get a good range of poems, we’ll consider splitting them into two books: one for 4-6 years old and 7-10.

This anthology will be edited by Rachel Piercey and Emma Wright and illustrated by Emma Wright. Rachel Piercey is currently an editor at Cadaverine magazine and her illustrated pamphlet of love poems, The Flower and the Plough, was published by the Emma Press in January 2013. Emma Wright runs The Emma Press.

To submit to this anthology, please send up to 3 poems (each no longer than 1.5 pages A4 portrait) in the body of your email AS WELL AS attached in a single Word document to myths@theemmapress.com, accompanied with a covering letter addressed to Rachel and Emma (just in the body of your email – no need to attach it as a separate document!). The deadline for submissions is Sunday 3rd August 2014, 23.00 GMT. We will aim to reply to all submissions by the end of November, but this may change according to the number of submissions we receive, so sign up to our newsletter for updates about our progress. Please scroll down the page to read our general submissions guidelines.

All poets must be members of the Emma Press Club, which means you must either have bought a book from the Emma Press website this calendar year, or already be in an Emma Press book. Read more about the Emma Press Club here.