Sandra Simpson is a journalist, wife and mother who lives in Tauranga, New Zealand.
In 2011 she was placed First and Third in the Kokako Haiku Contest (NZ); Second in the Robert Spiess Memorial Haiku Contest (US) and in the contemporary section of the HaikuNow! Contest (US); and received a Touchstone Award from The Haiku Foundation for one of the best haiku published in English in 2010, as judged by a panel of her haiku peers.
Other awards include Second place in the Friendly St Poets Society Haiku Contest (2010); co-winner in the Snapshot Press Haiku Calendar Contest (2009) and Third place in the Robert Frost Haiku Contest (2010) and the NZ Poetry Society Haiku Contest (2009).
Her work appears in Haiku 21: an anthology of contemporary English-language haiku (Modern Haiku Press, US, 2011); carving darkness: The Red Moon Anthology of English-Language Haiku 2011 (Red Moon Press, US, 2012); white lies: the Red Moon Anthology of English-language Haiku 2008 (Red Moon Press, 2009); the taste of nashi, the third New Zealand haiku anthology (Windrift, NZ, 2008); A New Resonance 5: Emerging Voices in English-Language Haiku (Red Moon Press, 2007).
Her “day job” sees her profile a garden and its owner every week for the local daily newspaper (she also takes the photos), and work part-time as a sub-editor for several community newspapers.
Since 2001 she has worked for the biennial Tauranga Arts Festival as the manager of the Readers & Writers programme, and since 2010 has developed a speaker series for the biennial Tauranga Garden and Artfest.
As well, Sandra is secretary of the Katikati Haiku Pathway committee, and editor of the Haiku NewZ website.
Sandra enjoys gardening and taking long walks, finding that both activities allow her mind to wander, often producing sketches for haiku. Other hobbies include reading, photography and laughing.
