The Waywiser Books Fall Auction & Showcase

This auction is part of an annual showcase supporting Waywiser Books, a 501(c)3 nonprofit poetry press.

Waywiser Books is a Kansas-based 501c3 nonprofit poetry press. It is the successor organization of Waywiser Press, which was founded by Phillip Hoy in 2001 to amplify the voices of American poets who were undervalued in England. When Hoy retired in 2025, he put the press’s legacy into the hands of four longtime board members—all poets based in the U.S.—and it became Waywiser Books.  In addition to stewardship of the Waywiser catalogue, we facilitate the Anthony Hecht Poetry Prize, a premiere early-career book award. Notable Waywiser publications include debuts from Erica Dawson and Dora Malech; new books by Alan Shapiro and Jeffrey Harrison; expansive dialogues with eminent poets (Seamus Heaney, John Ashbery, Thom Gunn, and more); Morri Creech’s Pulitzer Prize finalist The Sleep of Reason and several works republished as New York Review of Books Classics.