Call for Submissions: Spank the Carp

Spank the Carp 

Submissions Guidelines

We publish fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction, from any author including as yet unpublished writers or writers with only a few publications under their belt. See below, but also check out the editor's interview on Six Questions For and on Duotrope.

PREFERRED CONTENT
Trite but true, the best way to see if your work will be a good fit for SPANK the CARP is to read what's on the site.

Here's a link to Past Ponds, most recent first.
​Here's a link to the Editor's work published on StC.

Any genre, including hard science fiction, though PLEASE no fantasy, erotica, or sappy romance. Humor is good.

Flash Fiction (around 800 words or less).

Short stories (around 5000 words or less).

Poetry that is lyrical, where you've paid as much attention to the sound of the words as to their meaning.

​Free verse is okay as long as it doesn't read the same with or without line breaks. Same goes with poetry submissions in general.
​
Concrete or Shape poetry definitely encouraged.

Please no excerpts from larger works, for example a chapter from a memoir, and no chapbooks in full or in part.

NEW: Creative non-fiction: Same word limit as short stories. All types except biography, and Content Notes below apply.

Regardless, we prefer works that cut to the chase, that are pithy, and have a sense of importance (without overdoing it). And by that we mean, you wrote something you feel needed to be written and put out there in the world.

CONTENT NOTES
Please DO NOT SUBMIT anything erotic, sexual, pornographic, or portraying gratuitous violence. Think PG-13, maybe PG-18. Also do not submit political or religious screeds disguised as fiction or poetry. Sensitive thought-provoking actual fiction that makes a general religious or political point, like something utopian or dystopian is okay, just no preaching. It won't even be considered. Same goes with anything erotic, sexual, pornographic, or violent.

Anything you submit must be your own original creation. It must never have been published on any website or print publication that you do not personally own. If it has appeared only on your own blog or website or your own self-published printed material it is considered self-published. In this case, as long as you are the sole copyright owner, we will accept your work for consideration for reprint.

NOTE REGARDING AI: Please do not submit any work where you used AI in any fashion (other than say 'smart' type ahead/grammar checking) If you're not sure, please add a note to your cover email regarding your use.

Carpwork Gallery ARTWORK and PHOTOS
I'm looking for images and photos that depict Carp and Koi in artistic and natural settings and have a strong artistic element. See the Carpwork Gallery for examples. A one sentence credit will appear with your image or photo and a caption that you should provide. Submission process, compensation, and terms are the same as for written work.

NOTE: When submitting images, please include a creative caption.

SUBMISSION PROCESS - PLEASE NOTE
All stories must be submitted via email by the original poet/author - no third party submissions please. We will respond as quickly as possible. Turnaround time is approximately 60 days.
NOTE: By submitting your work you agree to the Terms and Agreements below as well as the note above regarding AI.

Please submit one short story, one flash, or up to three poems at a time. Simultaneous submissions are fine but please inform us if your submission is accepted for publication elsewhere.

​Please no resubmissions.

Please include:
- In the subject please include the type of piece you are submitting, for example: Submission - Poetry
​- In the body of your email: Your full name,
- A two sentence max description of your work,
- How you heard of SPANK the CARP (optional).
- Attach a docx, doc, or rtf formatted document (no PDFs please). For visual poetry, png or jpg only.
- Do not send a formal bio. If your work is accepted we will contact you for a formal bio. DO however tell us whether you have been published before.

Email to:

the_carp (at) spankthecarp.com

with the word Submission as the subject.

Voluntary TIP JAR Submissions: For $4 you will be guaranteed a response within 2 weeks, with feedback. This is totally voluntary and does not affect the editor's decision. Details and signup are here.

Compensation
No compensation can be offered at this time. If accepted, your work will appear prominently on the home page, with a link to its own page. This can easily be linked to from a personal or other website. Also, since we seek quality over quantity, in the issue in which your work appears, you will appear with only a few other authors and not buried in a sea of screen clutter.

Writing Competition: The Lost Kite Editions Chapbook Prize

LOST KITE CHAPBOOK PRIZE

The Lost Kite Editions Chapbook Prize is awarded annually to a chapbook of any genre (fiction, poetry, creative nonfiction, etc.). Collaborative, hybrid, and multi-genre submissions are also welcome. The winning author will receive a $1,500 award and 20 contributor copies. The winning chapbook will be published in spring, 2027.

The contest will be open until May 15th, 2026. We accept submissions from all writers, but make a concerted effort to welcome submissions from incarcerated writers. To that end, incarcerated writers will be welcome to submit until August 31st, 2026.

The winning manuscript will be selected by Hanif Abdurraqib.​

Guidelines

• We accept submissions through Submittable.

• Please do not include your name anywhere within the manuscript itself. Along with your manuscript, please submit a cover letter with a brief biographical note and, if desired, a statement or description that contextualizes your submitted work. While we may consider publishing work under a pseudonym, please include your legal name in your cover letter.

• Chapbooks should be between 20 and 50 pages in length (this does not include title, section break, or acknowledgement pages). We won't turn you away if you are a few pages over or under, but please stay close to that limit.

• Manuscripts containing individual stories, essays, poems, or excerpts that have been previously published online or in print are eligible; please simply note previously published work in your cover letter. If your manuscript has been previously published as a whole (including publication with a press, self-publication, online/digital publication, and publication in a small, limited-edition print run), however, then the manuscript is not eligible.

• The submission fee is $5.

• Simultaneous submissions are accepted. Please withdraw your manuscript(s) from consideration immediately if you plan to publish it elsewhere.

• You are welcome to submit multiple manuscripts. The $5 submission fee will apply to each manuscript submitted.

• We do not accept work generated with artificial intelligence.

Accommodations for incarcerated writers

• Incarcerated writers and those submitting on their behalf are welcome to submit by postal mail:

   P.O. Box 6037
  Minneapolis, MN 55406
   
  or by email:
   submissions@lostkite.org

• Typed submissions are preferred, but we will accept handwritten submissions from incarcerated writers.

• The $5 submission fee is waived for incarcerated writers and those submitting on their behalf.

• Incarcerated writers are welcome to submit until August 31st, 2026.

Writing Competition: Solstice 2026 Annual Literary Contest

Prizes: $1,000 (fiction), $500 (poetry), $500 (nonfiction), $500 (graphic lit)

Entry fee: $20

Deadline: June 1

Soltice Annual Literary Contest  

Rules & Guidelines

Cover sheet required with name, address, telephone number and email. Email and/or phone MUST be included to be considered. Please include the cover sheet in the same file as the actual submission. Do not put your name on the manuscript itself. Final judges will be choosing on the basis of the quality of your work. Please indicate the genre of your piece next to the title.

Each entry:

Fiction or Nonfiction: 25-page maximum, double-spaced, 12-point font, .DOC or .DOCX attachment; free-standing excerpts from books also accepted.

Poetry: 3-poem maximum, 12-point font, .DOC or .DOCX attachment.

Graphic Lit: Original artwork, multiple panels (no single image pieces), 1-6 pages preferred, maximum 8-10 pages, in JPG/PDF format.

You may submit more than once during the contest period but must pay a separate fee for each entry.

You may submit simultaneously elsewhere, but please contact us immediately if accepted by another journal.

We will not accept previously published work. Solstice has first publication rights, but copyright reverts to you upon publication. After the piece is published in our Summer Awards Issue, we will publish the piece in our Archives. All winners, finalists, and editors’ choice will be cited in future advertisements and announcements.

Solstice has a zero tolerance policy for AI generated submissions of any genre. Any individuals found to be submitting AI generated work will have that work rejected. Any reading fees sent to Solstice will not be refunded on the basis of rejection.

If you won last year’s contest, you must skip a year before resubmitting to the contest, but we encourage you to submit work to Solstice for general publication.

We will announce the winners, finalists, and editors’ choice approximately 6-8 weeks after the contest deadline.

After announcing the winners, finalists, and editors’ choice, all contest submissions will be automatically considered for standard publication unless you indicate otherwise.

The $20.00 entry fee must be paid online at the time of entry.

 We accept online submissions only through Submittable. No emails please.

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Oasis": Thin Air Magazine

 

Thin Air Magazine

Submissions for Thin Air 33 (Print) are OPEN 

Deadline: Oct. 18, 2026

Thin Air Online is open year-around!

Theme: Oasis–

Oasis is defined in Merriam Webster as the following: a fertile or green area in an arid region (such as a desert)
something that provides refuge, relief, or pleasant contrast

For Thin Air Magazine’s upcoming issue, we seek to expand upon this notion.

In a turbulent, and at times seemingly desolate world, what is your oasis? Where do you seek shelter, or find comfort? What spaces fill, sustain, and save you? Is your oasis the physical body, spiritual self, home, community, or another source? How does one create sanctuary in the desert of the world?

Alternatively, we consider the conditions that are required to produce the oasis, and subsequently, what surrounds it.

For there to be an oasis, there must first exist a desert. An oasis can only exist when it is surrounded by, or contrasted by, a severe lack of something crucial to survival. What does it mean to be surrounded by a landscape of hostility, scarcity, or exclusion? In other words, what is your desert, and what drives you to find your oasis? Hunger? Thirst? Reprieve? Or is it something else entirely?

With this in mind, we wonder what else the oasis can represent.

What if the oasis can be a form of resistance? We think of the various forms of sanctuaries that are created in the midst of violence, fear, and the ever escalating political tensions: what oases have you noticed forming in the face of danger, desolation, and inaccessibility?

As creatives, we know that writing may even serve as an oasis and constant. In your creative, safe, and bold spaces, we encourage you to write all that you feel, see, and know of these oasis possibilities.

Submitting comes with a $3.00 reading fee. In an effort to minimize barriers and encourage work from marginalized writers, we will wave this fee upon request at our discretion.

Please review our general and genre-specific guidelines below:

• We accept fiction and nonfiction up to 3,000 words.

• We accept up to three poems in one document totaling five or fewer pages.

• We only consider unpublished work. Please do not submit material previously published in anthologies, chapbooks, online, or on personal websites (including FB, Twitter/X, Insta, Flickr, blogs, etc.)

• We accept simultaneous submissions. If any part of your submission is selected for publication elsewhere, please notify us immediately using Submittable.

• In an effort to encourage submissions from both established and emerging writers with diverse voices, we read all submissions blind. Do not include any identifying information within your submission.

• Thin Air Magazine does not accept work from anyone affiliated with Northern Arizona University within the last 7 years.

• Thin Air Magazine aims to respond to your submission within 3-5 months. If you submit April-August, know that we likely won’t be able to respond until September when school is back in session. We appreciate your patience! Our staff is a volunteer-graduate-student-run magazine and we strive to read every submission carefully before making a decision.

Formatting Specifications:

• Please use Times New Roman, 12pt., double-spaced, 1 inch margins for all submissions except poetry, which should remain single-spaced.

• INCLUDE page numbers and a word count at the top of your manuscript.

• DO NOT INCLUDE your name/identifiers in your manuscript.

• If the unique format of your submission is critical to the piece, please feel free to keep your unique formatting.

• Note that we may have to alter format for printing due to physical restraints and requirements.

Copyright: We ask for first North American serial rights for work published in Thin Air Magazine. Copyright is retained by the author at all times.

Submission Expectations

Thin Air has a responsibility to build a safe, diverse community for contributors and readers alike. We have no tolerance for writing that is racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic, ableist, body shaming, Islamophobic, anti-semitic, or in any other way cruel. Your writing may, and in fact is encouraged to, grapple productively with these subjects. Do not send us unchecked bigotry or hate speech.

Acknowledgement

Thin Air is run by NAU graduate students on the Kinłání (occupied Flagstaff, Arizona) campus. We sit at the base of the Dook'o'oosłííd, on homelands sacred to Native Americans throughout the region. We strive to acknowledge and commemorate the indigenous past, present, and future of Kinłání.

Accountability

Thin Air is not and will never be perfect, but that doesn’t mean we won’t try. We strive to be an active voice for universal equity, and we commit to using our position in the literary world to uplift historically underrepresented voices and fight for the decolonization of literary magazines. If you notice we have missed the mark on anything, no matter how small, please reach out to us at:

thinairlitmag@gmail.com 

We thank you for your help on our path to becoming our best selves.

Thin Air Online

Thin Air Online is looking for your poems, art, fiction, hybrid works, tiny films, nonfiction, humor, songs, paintings, collages, interpretative dances, jokes, audio projects, and other precious creations. We especially appreciate submissions that don’t exactly fit into printed mediums.

NAU’s Thin Air literary website is invites its university community to submit their work. Submissions are open to all. Thin Air Online looks particularly for work that is playful but serious, in form, in content, however that might apply to you. Please do not submit seasonal work.

There is no reading fee for TAO, but we carefully select our publications. So submit away! If you want to support our work, please donate.

Please review our general and genre-specific guidelines for TAO below:

• Include a title in the title line.

• Clearly label your submission’s genre (Fiction, Nonfiction, Poetry, Visual Art, Genre-Defying/Hybrid).

• Clearly write your submission's title.

• Written submissions must be 5,000 words or less.

• Submit poems in batches up to 3.

• Video and audio pieces must be shorter than 10 minutes.

• We only consider unpublished work. Please do not submit material previously published in anthologies, chapbooks, online, or on personal websites (including FB, Twitter/X, Insta, Flickr, blogs, etc.)

• We accept simultaneous submissions. If any part of your submission is selected for publication elsewhere, please notify us immediately using Submittable.

• In an effort to encourage submissions from both established and emerging writers with diverse voices, Thin Air Online reads all submissions blind. Do not include any identifying information within your submission.

• Thin Air Online aims to respond to your submission within 3-5 months. If you submit April-August, know that we likely won’t be able to respond until September when school is back in session. We appreciate your patience! Our staff is a volunteer-graduate-student-run magazine and we strive to read every submission carefully before making a decision.

Copyright: We ask for first North American online serial rights. If your work is selected for Thin Air Online, we ask for exclusive online rights for 60 days from the date of publication. Copyright is retained by the author at all times.

Thank you for submitting!

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Kurdistan": The Markaz Review

 

The Markaz Review will accept simultaneous submissions, provided you inform us upon submitting your completed ms. If your work is accepted elsewhere, please contact us immediately. We use DUOSUMA for submissions.

TMR 60 • KURDISH ISSUE • July 2026

Kurdistan is an enigma, sometimes even to its own people, who are all too often forced to suppress their language and heritage, as a result of laws imposed from without, by colonial states determined to extinguish any Kurdish revolution, or through migration to the diaspora. In any event, the consequence is often the same: Kurdistan fading into a distant memory until it’s reduced to the second hyphenation of their identity. Through our Kurdish-themed issue, TMR is looking to embrace this dissonance, and in so doing, reject historical portrayals of Kurdistan.

The prevailing narrative has long been that having a common enemy should be the connective tissue that binds Kurds together. But that’s never been true. Inherently, Kurds are a nomadic people. The rough terrains of the mountains have created deep linguistic shifts from one regional dialect to another; dialects so pronounced that Kurds themselves see them as separate languages. So where does that leave identity? What does it mean to be Kurdish when the identity itself fractures the moment you try to define it?

TMR invites your responses to these questions, in whatever form inspires you to create — essays or creative nonfiction, short stories, poetry, interviews, reported pieces, art, photography, film/video, and more. We’re looking for submissions from across the diverse map that is Kurdistan, whether they reflect a vital, shared experience or, conversely, a singularly unique perspective. Our query/submission window opens on April 17, and closes on June 1.

The Markaz Review (TMR) is a nonprofit publication. TMR pays all contributors an honorarium within 30 days of publication. 

Submission link here. 

Call for Submissions: Turn & Work

Turn & Work

Turn & Work is an independent music and literary publication. We believe that a literate, creative subculture is essential for understanding the world we live in. Art is upstream of politics; it shapes people and culture. And somehow, despite all this technology, it’s harder than ever for independent artists to break through.

This site started as a book blog, but it’s evolved to be about more than that: independent music, original short stories, and other great work from around the web.

Because art is work, regardless of medium. It’s hard, it takes time, and it generally doesn’t pay well. It takes guts to share that work with the world and hope that it connects with people.

So, Turn & Work is our way of supporting the people who do that work. It’s a way to show appreciation for the art that’s connected with us and to share it with you.

We hope you find things you love here. If you do, share them widely. If you’ve spent some time here and have something you’d like to share with us, we’d love that too.

It is:

• 3-ish book reviews a week, plus an essentials list of what we think everyone should read

• 4-ish music features a week — reviews, interviews, and Backstory posts, where artists tell their own story in their own words. See some examples, and read the brief

• The Shortlist: curated links to excellent short fiction and creative nonfiction from around the web

• The Setlist: a weekly playlist of new independent music, plus callouts to artists worth your time

• Short Stories: original and reprinted short stories

• Welcome Distractions: the Thursday newsletter. Music, books, links, opinions, and a custom playlist for subscribers who request it

It isn't:

• Pay-for-play. We don’t take money from musicians or writers, directly or indirectly.

• Coverage of artists who already have ten publications writing about them

• “Band X Announces Y.” We don’t republish press releases or repackage announcements as content.

it might be:

Something even better! We’re always looking for people who are serious about something. If you have a beat (a genre, a scene, a love of literature nobody’s covering well) and you want to write about it, we want to hear from you. Guest posts, regular columns, one-offs. No pitching to an anonymous inbos: Email Hugh directly.

Simple rule: we cover things we’d want to find somewhere else. If you think your work belongs here, we want you to reach out. If you want to put someone else’s work on our radar, please do that too.

We don’t take money from artists or authors, directly or indirectly. We’ll happily accept freebies (ARCs, vinyl, or t-shirts have shown up from time to time), but coverage is always at our discretion. We don’t use SubmitHub or any pay-for-play discovery service.

Everything on Turn & Work is written by a human. We only cover work we actually care about.
For publicists and agencies

We work with publicists regularly and we’re always interested in early access to music that we would consider covering. We do reviews, premieres, Backstory posts (artist-written, no interview format), and Q&As. If you’re pitching, email Hugh. If you’re not sure whether it’s a fit, check the New Music features or the Setlist Archive first.

Always open. The only real requirement is that the story is compelling.

What we look for:

What we look for: fiction and creative nonfiction, flash through short story length. No hard minimum or maximum — if it’s over 2,000 words it should have a great hook. Any genre, any style. Reprints are welcome, just be upfront about prior publication. Poetry too, though I lean toward narrative verse that reads like flash fiction.

We don’t accept AI-generated text. If we suspect it’s AI-assisted, it’s a pass.

How to submit:

Send a Word doc with a short bio (one or two sentences). Simultaneous submissions are fine — just let us know if it gets picked up elsewhere. You keep your rights; we ask for first publishing rights only. We aim to respond within a month. No response means no.

Submit your story! 

We cover full albums, EPs, and singles. We lean toward indie rock, post-punk, punk rock, hyperpop, and electronic music with English lyrics — but a compelling song in any genre will get our attention. Check the Setlist Archive or Music Essentials to get a sense of what moves us.

Check the New Music features or the Setlist Archive to see what we dig.

What we look for:

Music that’s a little rough or weird, with a strong emotional core. Extra credit for Canadian and Australian artists.

What to include:

A link to your music (MP3s preferred, streaming is fine), an EPK or basic bio with at minimum your name and where you’re from, lyrics if available. Pre-releases welcome.

How We Cover Music:

Singles from early-stage artists go into Monday Music Posts. EPs and shorter projects get covered in New and Noted. Full features are for albums and EPs with a strong narrative core. Backstory posts are artist-written — no interview format, no Q&A, just the story behind the work in your own words, the more personal the better. We also do interviews and profiles.

Everything we cover during the week lands on the Friday Setlist alongside other new music we’ve found.

Submit your music 

We’re looking for people who are serious about something — a genre, a scene, a corner of literature or music that isn’t getting the coverage it deserves. Guest posts, regular columns, and one-offs all welcome. We don’t pay yet, but I expect that to change in 2026.

Come at US!

Call for Submissions on Theme of "Failure": Ivo Review

Ivo Review 

Open to Submissions for our Fifth Issue on the Theme of FAILURE!

See our Current Calls page for any special submission periods that might be open.

Deadline: July 30, 2026 

What We Look For

We are looking for prose, poetry, fiction, non-fiction, hybrid works, and dramatic works from emerging and established writers from around the world, particularly writers from historically underrepresented communities. We love the concept of narrative - we want to read storytellers telling stories in whatever form that takes for you.

Works should be primarily in English.

We consider simultaneous submissions but if a work is accepted elsewhere please let us know. We will be thrilled for you! We consider reprints but please indicate the original publication so that it can be credited - with a link to the work if possible so that we can also link to that publication.

We love visual art submissions and are always looking for cover art.

We will not consider AI generated work. At this time we are also not considering translations.

How to Submit

For art, please submit one piece that you would like considered for our cover art.

For poetry and flash or micro-fiction, please submit up to five (5) pieces of up to 100 lines for poetry. We consider micro-fiction to be up to 350 words, and flash to be 351 - 1000 words.

For longer works of fiction, non-fiction, or dramatic works please send up to two (2) pieces of up to 3000 words.

For dramatic works, we consider works that would be able to be produced as a 10 minute play or shorter. We love long dramatic monologues, but will also consider ensemble pieces.

Send submissions to:

editorivoreview@gmail.com

The subject line should be the THEME of the issue for which you are submitting work and the CATEGORY of the submission. (Example: LOST - POETRY) Please include a short cover letter with a short 3rd person author's bio in the body of the e-mail and attach submissions in a single .docx attachment.

Submissions that do not follow these simple guidelines will not be read.

Rights and Expectations

You retain all rights to your work. By submitting work to Ivo Review you are granting us the non-exclusive rights to publish your work in our online issues and to continue the display of that work on the online site. You are confirming that you are the author of the submitted work and that you retain the rights to submit it for publication. Works published online in Ivo Review will be considered for future anthologies, and authors will be contacted for permission and with information about payment if we are interested in using your work again in that way. We will promote your work, but we will never attempt to sell your work or to include it in any publication other than the issue in which it was originally published without your permission.

If a piece has not been previously published before Ivo Review, please credit us in any future publications.

At this time, we are not a paying market - though we do hope to be able to correct that soon. We do have every intention of nominating for Pushcart and other prizes including Best Small Fictions, Best Microfiction, and Best of the Net.

We anticipate that we will respond to submissions two to four weeks after the end of the reading period for that issue, but we are a very small operation and so cannot promise that it will not take us a bit longer. If you have not heard from us after six weeks from the end of the reading period for the issue you submitted for, please feel free to contact us for an update. We will not take it personally!

Call for Submissions: Exist Otherwise

 

Submissions Are Open for Exist Otherwise

Deadline: May 31, 2026

For details about submission periods, see our Editorial Calendar.

• Please only submit original works, written/created entirely by human beings.

• E.O. does not solicit or publish work that is created by AI or LLM software.

• We accept work that has been previously published, but please let us know.

• Simultaneous submissions are fine.

• If we publish original work, we ask you to acknowledge that the work was first published with Exist Otherwise, but we do not require this.

• We require all work to be submitted through our Submission Form.

Our Interests

Identity

We are interested in works about identity, the self, and the personal. How do we, as unique individuals, navigate a world that doesn’t necessarily conform to us? What does it mean to be an individual in a society? How many are you? Are you a single person with a single identity, or do you have the capacity to embody multiple personas? How do you present yourself to the world? To your friends? Co-workers? Lovers? Are you even you?

Gender

We are curious about gender. What is it? How can we move away from the restrictions inherent in gender duality? How important is gender to our sense of self? Is gender fixed, fluid, or subject to change? Why is gender important? Is it?

Trauma & Recovery

What hardships have you endured? How have they shaped you? In particular, how have they shaped your sense of self? What obstacles or challenges have you overcome? What obstacles stand in your way? How has society pushed you down, and how have you gotten back up? Have you gotten back up? If not, what do you seek or need to be whole? If submitting potentially triggering content, feel free to include a warning.

Intuition & Dreams

What are they? Where do they come from? Are these two phenomena related? Do they inform or influence you or your work? Are they integral to your survival as a human being?

Before You Submit:

Theme & Prompt

Each issue of Exist Otherwise will have a theme. The theme will often be a quote from Claude Cahun, but not always.

Responding to the theme is optional.

What to Submit

Writing

We are no longer accepting fiction or scripts.

We accept the following types of written work: poetry, prose, essays, creative non-fiction, hybrid, or experimental writing.

Short works (under 100 words): You may submit up to three (3) works per issue.

Longer Works (300-500 words): You may submit only work one (1) per issue.

Photography/Art

We are looking for photography that tells a story. Your art doesn’t necessarily have to have people in it, but we’re looking for representations of, or responses to, questions of identity, gender, recovery, intuition, dreams, or any other aspect of human existence in the world. We rarely accept purely abstract imagery.

To increases your chance of having your photography accepted, you may want to browse the following archives:Recent Published Artwork
Accepted/Published Artwork from EO Issues 1-12
Claude Cahun & Marcel Moore Art Gallery

You may submit up to three (3) artworks per issue.

What Not to Submit

• Don’t submit work that you do not have the rights to.

• Erotica is fine, but nothing explicit.

• We appreciate horror as a genre, but it’s not what we’re looking for.

• No hate, racism, sexism, misogyny, transphobia, torture, gratuitous violence, or anything that aspires to cause harm.

How to Submit

What follows are our requirements for submissions of work to us. We will not typically reject a submission if it doesn’t meet these requirements exactly. However, any contributor who consistently submits work that is sloppy or hard to understand, is less likely to receive a notice of acceptance.

We require submissions to come from our Submission Form. This allows us to better keep track of them.

Writing Submissions Format

We accept works submitted in plain text, .rtf, .doc, .docx, or .pdf.

If your written work requires any special formatting, pdf is suggested.

Artwork Submissions Format

We love black and white or experimental photography, and photomontage, but we will consider any kind of art.

All submitted images should be 72-96 dpi and JPG. Please submit images with a MINIMUM long side of 1000 pixels. File size should not exceed 2 MB.

If your art is accepted for publication, you may be asked to submit a High Resolution version through our Artwork Details Form. Assistance with sizing and formatting is available after work has been accepted.

Special Note About Artwork: If your photo is accepted, you will be REQUIRED to provide Alt Text for each image.

Payment

• We pay $15 for each individual published work.

• Written works may not include art or illustration. Words only, please.

• Hybrid works are works which incorporate both writing and art. These count as an individual work. This is an example of Hybrid: Heads Up Dream for Peace.

• Art, of course, may include writing, but it must be part of the image.

• If you have any doubts about the above, please contact us BEFORE submitting your work.

• Payment is issued within 1-3 days of publishing.

We can only guarantee payment through Paypal or Venmo. If you are in the US, we can mail you a check. If you are unable to accept any of those, let us know ahead of time and we’ll try to work something out.

Call for Submissions: AGNI

AGNI 

We look for writing that catches experience before the crusts of habit form—poetry and prose that resist ideas about what a certain kind of writing “should do.” We seek out writers who tell their truths in their own words and convince us as we read that we’ve found something no one else could have written.

When to submit

Our online submission portal is open from September 1st through May 31st, with a monthlong break from 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on December 15th through January 15th. We welcome manuscripts by mail between September 1st and May 31st. (Submissions mailed to us in June, July, or August will be returned unread, provided sufficient return postage is included.)

Things to know when submitting

• Nearly everything we publish is unsolicited.
• We encourage submissions from writers of all identities, living anywhere, published and unpublished.
• We will not consider writing that has already been published in English, whether in a book, magazine, newspaper, or on an app, a website, a social media feed, or a publicly accessible online community.
• We consider only work written in English or translated into English.
• We require submissions to be the writer’s or translator’s own work, and must be told up front, in your cover letter, if any element was written in collaboration with others, taken from found materials, or developed using any computer algorithm or artificial intelligence.
• We are interested in personal essays, think-pieces, memoir, free verse, blank verse, visual poetry, prose poems, shaped or concrete poems, formal or structured poetry, short stories, and short shorts; we do not publish academic essays or purely journalistic writing.
• We do not publish genre romance, horror, mystery, or science fiction; however, we are open to writing that borrows elements from any of these.
• We will consider excerpts if they read as if they were meant to stand alone.
• We have no word limits, though space is at a premium and length sometimes affects our decisions.
• You can familiarize yourself with the magazine by ordering a recent print issue or perusing the writing that appears here at AGNI Online, which includes selected pieces from our decades in print, along with everything we’ve ever published exclusively online. The AGNI blog features posts by writers who have appeared previously in AGNI or AGNI Online.
• Each submission in the main genres—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and hybrid—costs $3 when sent through our online portal. (Subfolio will briefly redirect you to Boston University’s secure payment page.) Reading fees help us remunerate the editors who spend time with your work. To avoid paying a fee, please see “Sending by paper mail” below. If both options pose a difficulty, please contact us, specifying your genre.

Some requests

• Do not ever email your work; we will not read or consider emailed submissions.
• Please send one story, one essay, or up to five poems at a time, and please submit only once during our September-to-May reading period.
• Please do not submit revisions of work we’ve already considered.
• Please do not query us about your submission until four months have passed. We work hard to respond within two, but we’re not always able. If you submit online, you can log in anytime to check status. “Received” means your work is under consideration.

Paper submissions

If you’d rather not submit through the online portal, please address your envelope to Fiction Editor, Poetry Editor, or Nonfiction Editor and mail to:

AGNI Magazine
Boston University
236 Bay State Road
Boston, MA 02215

There is no fee for work sent on paper. Please note that regular post is fine; there’s no advantage to using a faster or more expensive service.

• Do not mail your work in the months of June, July, or August.
• If you want us to reply by mail, please enclose a stamped, addressed envelope (SAE). If the envelope is large enough and you include sufficient postage, we will take reasonable efforts to return the manuscript; otherwise, it will be recycled. If you’d like to be notified by email instead, please include your email address and skip the SAE.
• Do not send your only copy; we cannot accept responsibility for your manuscript.

How to withdraw

You are welcome to submit the same work to other magazines simultaneously. If any part of your submission is accepted elsewhere, it’s essential to withdraw it from our consideration as soon as possible. ONLINE SUBMITTERS: Log in to your Subfolio account and click “Open” to the right of the submission. On the next screen, click “Withdraw Submission” to fully withdraw, or “Add Comment” to let us know which subset needs to be withdrawn. PAPER SUBMITTERS ONLY: Contact us with a brief withdrawal note.

Payments and rights

All submissions are considered for both print and online publication. (Blog publication is limited to writers whose work has previously appeared in AGNI or AGNI Online.)

We buy first worldwide serial rights and pay $30 per printed (or printed-out) page for accepted prose, and $50 per page for accepted poetry (50% more in each category for translations), up to a maximum of $300. We also give a year’s subscription to AGNI. In the case of print publication, each contributor receives two copies of the issue their work appears in, and we send up to four additional copies to friends or family.

In all cases, copyright remains with the author.

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions on the Theme of "Noise": The Suburban Review

Sound the alarm! The Suburban Review is seeking your most raucous and resonant work for issue #42: NOISE. So, what’s all the racket about?

We want love poems that go bump in the night, odes to birdsong, and sonnets inspired by protest chants. Send us artwork that marches to the beat of its own drum and comics that remix the classics. Have you penned a pop-punk manifesto, an uproarious essay, or a short story that’s bound to wake up the neighbours? Rock on! We’re all ears…

Australian submissions open from 10:00 a.m. 6th of April — 5:00 p.m. 3rd of May (AEST)

International submissions open from 10:00 a.m. 27th of April — 5:00 p.m. 3rd of May (AEST)

Extra subscribers week from 5:00 p.m. 3rd of May — 5:00 p.m. 10th of May (AEST)

We allow simultaneous submissions. If it’s been accepted elsewhere just email us at:

submissions@thesuburbanreview.com

with ‘Withdrawing submission’ as your subject line.

We only allow one submission per person (that means you need to choose if you want to submit fiction, non-fiction, poetry, comics, or art). To submit poetry (that’s a maximum of 3 poems), make sure all the poems are in a single document. We only accept .doc or .docx for prose and poetry, .pdf or .png for artwork. 

You do not need to be a subscriber to submit. However, if you are not already a subscriber, your rate will be less the cost of an annual subscription (which means a whole year of fabulous TSR content for you to enjoy!)

FICTION

2000-2500 words—no more than that! (payment $450)
1000-2000 words (payment $375)
500-1000 words (payment $300)

CREATIVE NON-FICTION

2000-2500 words—no more than that! (payment $450)
1000-2000 words (payment $375)
500-1000 words (payment $300)

POETRY

Suite of three poems—no more than that! (payment $550)
One poem over 30 lines (payment $375)
One poem under 30 lines (payment $300)

COMICS + ART

2 page comic B&W or Colour (payment $300)
1 page illustration B&W or Colour (payment $200)
1 page cover art (payment $300)

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions: Peatsmoke Journal

 

We accept previously unpublished poetry, fiction, flash, and nonfiction. Simultaneous submissions are fine, but please let us know right away if your work is accepted elsewhere. You can include a cover letter full of amusing tidbits about you or of fascinating trivia you learned from a podcast recently, but we are not interested in reading a list of the journals your work has appeared in. What is important to us is that you are sending us writing that feels urgent and necessary, work that is ready to go out for a stroll in the world. As a journal, we are committed to publishing diverse voices of all kinds.

We know how nerve-wracking it can be to check your inbox every morning, hoping to hear back from a journal, so we do our best to make our turnaround time as quick as possible. We will try to respond to every submission within two months, if not sooner. Please do not send more than one submission in any genre until you have heard back from us.

Unfortunately, we will sometimes need to charge for submissions. We are a small volunteer staff with a limited budget, and this charge will cover only our costs for running Submittable. However, we want to ensure that submitting to Peatsmoke remains accessible to all. We will provide as many free submission periods as we can throughout the year. If you are submitting during a paid submission period and are unable to pay the $3 submission fee, please send us an email at:

editors@peatsmokejournal.com 

letting us know, and we will waive your submission fee. Also, we offer free submissions for marginalized writers, as it is so important to us to support the words of those who have been traditionally underrepresented in the writing community.

Big News: We are now paying contributors!

We pay $10/per piece. We wish it were more, and hopefully it will be in the future. We would love to pay a million dollars/piece, since that is how much we feel you’re worth. We will also give your work a forever home on our website, sing your praises, and always love you! We nominate for prizes and anthologies, including Pushcart, Best of the Net, and Best Small Fictions. If published with us, we ask that you give Peatsmoke First North American Serial Rights and electronic media rights to your work. The copyright reverts back to the author upon publication, but we ask that Peatsmoke be acknowledged if the work is subsequently published in book form or reprinted in another venue.

We aren't looking for particular styles or types of writing, but here are some things we consider when reading:

Fiction

We’re into fiction that explores the human condition with empathy and curiosity. We love reading fully realized characters who are pushed and challenged, and clear, carefully-crafted sentences that bring them to life. Speculative and experimental work is absolutely welcome here.

Important: One story per submission between 1,001-7,000 words.

Flash

We love flash with strong sentence-level writing and compelling images that hold a moment and explode it, taking us to unexpected depths in a small space. We're excited to receive both flash fiction and flash CNF. If it's important to you that we know the genre you're submitting, please drop us a note in your cover letter to tell us. Realism, speculative, and experimental work, or a mix of all of these, is very welcome. Feel free to get weird — we’re here for it.

Important: An individual flash should be no longer than 1000 words. You may include up to 3 pieces in your submission.

Poetry

Nothing excites us more than a stellar combination of image and sound. We’re interested in how the two collide and inform each other and the work they’re doing. Images that have energy are the best images. Sounds and forms that follow content are the best sounds and forms. We want to be able to understand what’s going on in your poem by the weight and lilt of it in our mouths. We read everything aloud. We pay attention to line breaks. If we’ve seen it before, we don’t want to publish it. Please send up to three poems of any length.

Nonfiction

We love nonfiction pieces we can’t classify. If it’s a brief flash prose poem using academic language that’s also a sonnet, we want to read it. We most admire essays that (like poetry) emphasize image, that show the process of discovery. Please send only one piece at a time.

Artwork

Peatsmoke features artists in each issue, with art paired with each story and poem and displayed prominently on our main page. We are into any kind of 2-D art that appears well on a website, with the exception of comics. Send us your collage, your photography, your paintings, your drawings, your woodcuts, your etchings, your linotypes, your sand art — whatever it is, we'd love to check it out. For our consideration, please give us a submission of 5-10 images. Please send only one submission at a time, and wait until you have received a response before submitting again.

Sometimes it can take months, even up to a year, before we accept or decline, a submission, especially if we like your work. We pair art and writing, so finding a match can take time, but we realize the long wait can be frustrating. If you want an update, feel free to send our art editor, Shagufta, a message after it has been three months since you submitted. If you would like to have your submission opened for editing to replace art that was accepted elsewhere, let us know at any time.

Submit your work here.

Writing Competition: Cave Canem Prize

The Cave Canem Prize

The Cave Canem Prize supports the work of Black poets to overcome the obstacle of publishing their first book of poems. Awarded to one poet annually, the Prize recipient receives a monetary award, as well as having their manuscript published by one of our partner publishers, Graywolf Press; University of Pittsburgh Press; or University of Georgia Press.

Applications for the 2027 Cave Canem Prize are open April 1-30, 2026.

No entry fee. 

Award

Winner receives $10,000; publication through one of our partner presses; 15 copies of the book; and a featured reading with the selected judge, presented by Cave Canem.

 Eligibility

All unpublished, original collections of poems written in English by Black poets who have not had a full-length book of poetry published by a professional press. Cave Canem defines Black poets as any poet who identifies as a member of the African Diaspora. Submissions must be paginated with a font size of 11 or 12, and 60 – 75 pages in length, inclusive of title page and table of contents.

Black authors of chapbooks and self-published books with a maximum print run of 500 copies are also eligible to apply.

Please note that in the event that an applicant has submitted the same manuscript to other competitions and receives an award, they must disclose this information to Cave Canem. By applying, the Cave Canem Prize Winner agrees to be present in the continental United States at her or his own expense shortly after the book is published in order to participate in promotional reading(s).

Exclusions

Current or former students, colleagues, employees, family members and close friends of the judge; current or former employees and members of the board of Cave Canem Foundation or Graywolf Press; and authors who have published a book or have a book under contract with Graywolf Press are ineligible.

If any of the selected authors fall under the above exclusions, they will be disqualified and a replacement chosen. As the poetry community is small and the contest is judged without knowledge of the submitter’s identity, acquaintance with the judge or participation in a workshop taught by the judge are not disqualifying criteria. 

More information and entry portal here. 

Call for Submissions: Feel Literary Magazine

 

Thank you for submitting to Feel Literary Magazine. We look forward to reading your work!

Our submission periods are: November 15 – February 28 (Magazine Published in March)
April 15 – July 31 (Magazine Published in August)

Our response time is 1-2 months, but it may be shorter depending on submission volume.

Submissions are open to people 18 years or older.

Before submitting, please read our guidelines:

• Please only submit previously unpublished work (social media and personal blogs counts as published work).

• We accept simultaneous submissions, but please notify us via email:

feel.literary@gmail.com

if your work is accepted elsewhere.

• Should your work be accepted for publication, it may be lightly edited to correct minor spelling/punctuation errors, or to conform with “house style.”

• All work must be submitted in either Times New Roman or Arial Font, and in a doc or docx. format.

• Please submit no more than 1-3 pieces per submission period.

• Submissions with more than 3 pieces will not be considered.

Poetry: each poem should be no longer than one page.

Flash Prose: each piece should be no longer than 750 words.

By submitting to Feel Literary Magazine, you are granting the magazine the non-exclusive right to publish accepted work electronically and to archive it perpetually, as long as the site remains online.

Writers retain their copyright in all cases.

It is your responsibility to ensure that your work is your own and is not plagiarized.

If your work is subsequently published elsewhere, please acknowledge Feel Literary Magazine as the site of first publication.

While we are unable to pay contributors, we are happy to promote your publication on our Instagram and TikTok accounts, if granted your permission.

NOTE: We do not accept any work written with AI. We do not accept any work that perpetuates racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, etc. or otherwise hateful language or ideas. 

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions: Changing Skies

We read for both Hindsight and Changing Skies on a rolling basis. To be considered for the Changing Skies V print issue, please submit pieces by October 1st, 2026. We only accept through Submittable, where we charge no fee.

All submissions are considered for publication either in print or online. While we cannot offer payment, we send print copies to all published contributors. We also distribute journals annually at AWP conferences and locally here in Boulder, Colorado. All of our issues are available for free online as PDFs.

All submissions undergo a blind review process before being accepted.

We welcome submissions from everyone except current teaching faculty at the University of Colorado Boulder.

We only publish creative nonfiction writing, fact-checking as necessary.

Any necessary textual citation should follow Chicago Manual of Style footnote format.

AI-generated submissions will be rejected.

Hindsight publishes all forms of creative nonfiction (including narrative journalism, creative scholarship, and nonfiction poetry). Pieces for our Changing Skies issues must in some way address the natural world and/or the relationship between the natural world and humanity.

All submissions are considered for publication in print, online, or both.

We only accept the following file types:

Word files (.docx, .doc) for writing.

JPG's or PDF's for art or work including graphics.

For all prose, use double-spaced Times New Roman 12 point type, 1" margins, and indented paragraphs.

For prose in sections, indicate space breaks with a centered hashtag.

For all poetry, use single-spaced Times New Roman 12 point type, double spacing between stanzas.

For all poetry, please upload all pieces in one file (.doc, .docx), unless you are submitting separately to both journals.

Please remove your name from your piece, including file name, first page with title, headers, and pagination, to ensure anonymous reviewing. If your writing includes an identifiable name for you (beyond simply a common first name, etc.) please replace with "MY NAME" and we will restore your name in editing if accepting your piece for publication.

We accept simultaneous submissions, but please notify us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere, through Submittable, and pull the piece. We publish only previously unpublished work and obtain First North American Serial Rights: all rights revert to you as soon as we publish your work first. We may then republish or excerpt your work unless you request that we not do so. 

Submit your work here.

Call for Submissions: The Metaworker

Submission windows for 2026:
April 1 to May 31
September 1 to October 31

Here at The Metaworker, we are looking for writing and art that offers a wide range of new perspectives, upends stereotypes and tropes, plays with form or style, or that otherwise surprises, challenges, or enchants. The pieces we publish may sometimes be a little rough around the edges but we enjoy them because they are one of a kind works. We accept any genre or style from people of all backgrounds.

We publish a new piece every Monday at 12pm Pacific. We also post on Fridays and sometimes Wednesdays, depending on how many submissions we accept or what fun projects we have going on (like our podcast episodes and newsletter).

Here’s a quick rundown of what you need to know:

• Include a bio written in 3rd person.

• Cover letter optional but appreciated.

• Simultaneous submissions are okay.

• Reprints published at least 2 years prior are okay.

• You cannot submit to more than one call simultaneously. Submit to EITHER general call OR micro call OR Art/Misc.

• Pieces will be published as-is. We do not accept revisions (unless requested) nor do we edit pieces (except for light proofreading).

• Response time: 3-6 months.

• If you’ve been accepted, please wait 3 months before submitting again.

Read below for details about our three calls.

Submission Requirements for General Call:

WANT: 

• 2 pieces max (aka 2 individual poems or prose pieces).

• 3,000 words total (with page numbers). If you send two pieces, the total word count of both pieces should not be more than approx. 3k words combined.

• Submit .doc .docx .txt or .rtf formats for prose.

• Send each piece in a separate file.

• Accompanying translations are okay to send alongside the English version.

• Any genres and styles.

• Works created by humans.

DO NOT WANT:

• Text written, co-written, or assisted by generative AI or LLMs. (Spell check and basic grammar check are okay.)

• Huge novel excerpts or 3+ pieces – these will be automatically declined.

• The only contact info we need from you is your email. Including other info (like address and phone number) in your submission documents is unnecessary for us.

• Submissions by email are not accepted (unless for accessibility reasons).

• Research papers or news articles.

• Racist, ableist, sexist, or other discriminatory works.

• Gore or sex for the sake of shock value.

• Fonts that are unreadable.

HARD SELLS:

• Political rants
• Cancer stories
• Wake-up stories / it’s all just a dream
• Death at the end (See former EIC Matthew’s article about this)

Submission Requirements for Micro Call:

WANT:

• You may submit EITHER micro prose OR micro poetry, but not both. 

• Micro Prose: up to 5 pieces, 10 to 300 words each

• Send all pieces in a single file.

• Pieces that make every word count!

• Strong sense of place or character.

• Pieces that leave an emotional impact and/or that are more than the sum of their parts.

OR:

• Micro Poetry up to 5 pieces, each 60 words or less

• Send all pieces in a single file.

• Surprise us! (With wordsmithery :P)

DO NOT WANT:

• Text written, co-written, or assisted by generative AI or LLMs. (Spell check and basic grammar check are okay.)

• Prose pieces that read like the setup of a joke, with the last sentence being the punchline.

Submission Requirements for Art & Miscellaneous Call:

• You may submit no more than 2 pieces of: Visual art, collage, or photography, but we do NOT accept AI art

• Web comics / illustrations / comic strip style pieces / graphic novel or picture book excerpts / plays and screenplays / hybrid works / etc.

• Experimental pieces (3,000 words max) that work well in an online format, such as: Audio pieces / monologues / spoken word

• Ergodic stories

• Multimodal stories that include gifs or hyperlinks

• Anything else up to 3,000 words that doesn’t fit neatly into one category–surprise us! (Check out our Wish List for more ideas.)

If you send two writing pieces, the total word count of both pieces should not be more than approx. 3k words combined.

For art, please include details about camera, lens, drawing/painting medium, collage materials, etc. and a short description of your piece, such as the location, what inspired you, how long it took to complete, etc.

Stick to .jpeg, .png or .tiff files. Audio/video should be in .mp3 or .mp4

Place EACH of your submissions in its own individual file. (separate docs for writing, separate jpegs for images).

More information and submission portal here. 

Writing Competition: Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize

The University of Pittsburgh Press announces the Agnes Lynch Starrett Poetry Prize for a first full-length book of poems. Named after the first director of the Press, the prize carries a cash award of $5,000 and publication by the University of Pittsburgh Press in the Pitt Poetry Series under its standard royalty contract. The winner will be announced in the fall; no information about the winner will be released before the fall announcement. The Starrett Prize is our only venue for first-book poetry manuscripts. The volume of manuscripts received prevents the Press from offering critiques or entering into correspondence about manuscripts other than the one chosen for publication. Please do not call or e-mail the press.

Manuscripts submitted to the contest will not be returned. Please keep a copy of the manuscript.

Eligibility

The award is open to any poet writing in English who has not had a full-length book of poetry published previously. We define "full-length book" as a volume of 48 or more pages published in an edition of 500 or more copies. Books whose publication costs have been borne by their authors are excluded from this definition. University of Pittsburgh employees, former employees, current students and those who have been students within the last three years are not eligible for the award.

Format for Submissions

Manuscripts should be between 48 and 100 pages. Please also include your curriculum vitae.

Results will be announced in major poetry and writing magazines once a winner has been chosen.

Fee for Submission 

Each manuscript must include a submission fee for $25.00.

Multiple Submissions

Manuscripts being considered by other publishers are allowed, but if a manuscript is accepted for publication elsewhere, please notify the Press in writing.

Dates for Submission

Manuscripts must be received during March and April. That is, they must be received on or after March 1 and on or before April 30.

If you have any questions about these guidelines, please email:

info@upress.pitt.edu

Submit your entry here. 

Publication Announcement

 I'm very pleased to share with you the publication of my braided essay, "Burn Scar," in the anthology, A Brand New Word in the End Drops Out (Iron Oak Editions). It's about the multiple traumas of forest fires and flash floods occurring simultaneously with a family crisis. 

https://www.ironoakeditions.com/

Call for Submissions: Gold Man Review

GOLD MAN REVIEW ONLY ACCEPTS SUBMISSIONS FROM RESIDENTS OF CALIFORNIA, OREGON, WASHINGTON, ALASKA, AND HAWAII. ALL OTHERS WILL BE REJECTED. 

We accept simultaneous submissions, but please let us know immediately if your work has been accepted elsewhere. All submissions to Gold Man Review must be original, unpublished work from writers, and artists residing in the states of California, Oregon, Washington, Alaska, and Hawaii.

All submissions need to have a cover letter, detailing the submission (including word count), along with your first and last name, pen name (if you have one), physical address, email address, phone number, and a brief biography. Submissions without an accompanying cover letter per our guidelines will not be considered.

Deadline: June 16, 2026 

Although we are open to all types of writing and art forms, we are not interested in material with gratuitous language, sex, or violence or material that seeks to harm, endanger, or threaten any person or persons. We are generally not interested in genre heavy work.

Only electronic submissions via our submission manager will be accepted at this time. All submitters will receive a response by email regarding the status of his or her submission. We usually respond within 60 days, but if you have not heard back in six months, send us an email requesting the status of your submission.

Gold Man Review will request first-time North American Serial Rights for publication of accepted work. We ask for exclusive rights to use the work for a period of 60 days from when the work is published. After that time, rights revert back to the author and the work may be reprinted as long as appropriate acknowledgement to Gold Man Review is made.

POETS: Although we do accept up to three poems per poet, each poem must be submitted separately. Cover letter can be copied and pasted.

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions: PRISM International

 

PRISM international publishes exciting, original, literary material from established and emerging writers in Canada and around the world.

Submissions are currently OPEN for issue 65.1 REVELRY. They will be open until June 14th.

Reply times range between six to twelve months, and we may not be able to respond to emails regarding the status of a submission. Some of our content is generated from our annual fiction, poetry, short forms, and creative non-fiction contests. Please visit our contest page for more details.

Please note: PRISM does not accept submissions from current and incoming students and faculty of the University of British Columbia’s School of Creative Writing (this includes the UBC Optional-Residency MFA Program). Work submitted by incoming students prior to their acceptance to the UBC School of Creative Writing, if still under consideration, must be withdrawn. In order to submit, UBC alumni cannot have taken a UBC School of Creative Writing course during the previous two years.

PRISM does not publish the same writer twice in a publication year.

GENERAL SUBMISSION GUIDELINES:

Submissions must be made through Submittable. We do not accept submissions via email or mail, except from incarcerated writers. For all other submitters, we charge a $3.00 CAD reading fee per submission. Writers for whom the $3.00 CAD fee is prohibitive are welcome to submit using the Inclusive Access option on Submittable.

Submissions should be typed, double-spaced, and paginated. Please specify the genre of your submission in your cover letter. All submissions should be set in Times New Roman, 12-point font.

Include in your cover letter your full contact information (including your email address) and a bio of 50 words or fewer that makes reference to where you live.

We accept simultaneous submissions, and we ask that you let us know if your piece is accepted elsewhere, OR withdraw it from our Submittable. We purchase first North American serial rights and pay $40 CAD per printed page for prose and $45 CAD per printed page for poetry. Contributors also receive two copies of the issue in which their work appears.

We encourage submissions from Indigenous writers, writers of colour, writers with disabilities, 2SLGBTQIA+ writers, and writers from other intersectional and marginalized groups, including low-income earners. If you identify as one or more of the above and would like to let us know, please mention it in your cover letter.

PROSE GUIDELINES
We accept fiction, creative non-fiction, comics, hybrid works, and literary essays. We do not publish rhetorical, academic, or strictly journalistic non-fiction.

Our preferred length for submissions is 4,000 words or less. We have a limited page count and aim to feature a variety of voices.

Submit only one piece at a time, unless you are submitting flash fiction or non-fiction (under 1,000 words), in which case you may submit up to three pieces in a single document. Please wait to hear back before submitting again.

Click here to submit prose.

If you have any questions about these guidelines or a piece you’ve already submitted, please email Zahra Mayeesha at:

prism.prose@ubc.ca

POETRY GUIDELINES
Submit up to four poems, to a maximum of six pages. Do NOT submit six one-page poems.

We welcome cross-genre and interdisciplinary poetry and poetics.

In your cover letter, please specify the number of poems you are submitting and list the titles of the poems.

Poetry submissions should be typed and single-spaced. If you would like to submit poems with alternate spacing, please mention it in your cover letter and submit a PDF instead of a Word document.

Click here to submit poetry.

If you have any questions about these guidelines or a piece you’ve already submitted, please email Ayda Niknami at:

prism.poetry@ubc.ca.

Translation PRISM welcomes the best of translation into English from all over the world and offers compensation and contributor copies to original authors as well as the translators. Let us know if you’d like to see sample translator and original author contracts to get an idea of the information that we require.

We only accept translations that have been undertaken with the permission of the original author or rights holder, and we will ask to see confirmation of this permission before we publish.

Please include a copy of the original work with your submission.

Poetry Translations We pay $45 CAD/printed page plus two mailed contributor copies, and $30 CAD/printed page to the original author plus two mailed contributor copies. PRISM may choose to publish original poems alongside translations, and this will be up to the editor to decide on a case-by-case basis.

Prose Translations We pay $40 CAD/printed page for prose translations plus two mailed contributor copies, and $25 CAD/printed page to the original author up to $200 CAD, plus two mailed contributor copies.

Visual Art We accept visual art submitted through submittable in high-resolution JPEG, TIF or PNG files. We pay $300 CAD for the cover of one issue, along with two copies of that issue. An image of the cover will also appear on our website, the British Columbia Association of Magazine Publishers website, and the affiliated websites of Magazines Canada. 

We accept visual art for interior pages in PRISM in high-resolution JPEG, TIF or PNG files. We pay $50 CAD per interior page, up to $250 CAD, and we can print a limited number of pages per issue in colour. We provide two contributor copies.

We are happy to pay additional licensing and copyright fees if necessary, or to provide additional contributor copies to the artist’s studio or gallery.

Reasonable exceptions to our guidelines will be made for submissions from incarcerated writers.

Call for Submissions: Mud Season Review

 

Submissions are open between April 1 – April 30, 2026.

NOTE: We may close the reading period early by genre if volume demands. We want to be sure to give your work the attention it deserves! Please keep this in mind as you consider submitting your work.

General guidelines:

We seek deeply human work that will teach us something about life, but also about the craft of writing or visual art, and work that is original in its approach and that in some way moves us. Publishing and celebrating a diverse range of voices is important to us, so please include in your cover letter a brief biographical statement (50 words or less) as you would like it to appear with your published work. For more on what we look for in submissions, read an interview with our founding editor.

At Mud Season Review, we celebrate the unique voice and creativity of human authors. While we acknowledge the potential of AI as a tool for artistic exploration, we believe in preserving the essence of human expression in writing. Therefore, we do not accept submissions that are predominantly generated by artificial intelligence. If AI is used as a supplementary tool in the creative process, we encourage authors to disclose and explain its role in their submission notes.

We accept simultaneous submissions. However, please withdraw your work immediately should a piece you’ve submitted be accepted elsewhere. If you are withdrawing your entire submission, please log in to your Submittable account and click “withdraw.” If you are withdrawing only a part of your poetry or art submission, please add a note to your submission advising which piece(s) you are withdrawing. We strive to respond to all submissions within 2 months. You can track your submission with Duotrope.

We also offer a feedback request service, which features written feedback from our highly qualified reviewer team. Please submit under the appropriate category. Work submitted to this service is not considered for publication. Writers and artists are welcome to submit to Mud Season Review for publication during reading periods.

We do not accept mailed submissions, emailed submissions, multiple submissions (submitting again to the same or another category before getting a response), or anything that has previously appeared in print or online (including on your personal blog or website, artwork excepted). We accept flash fiction; please include two to three pieces in your submission. We do not accept translations at this time. If you have already been published in Mud Season Review, please refrain from submitting for one year after the date of the issue in which you were published. Please send submissions through Submittable only; submissions sent via email will not be considered. Please use a standard 12-point font. For fiction and nonfiction, please double space.

We acquire First North American Serial Rights (FNASR) upon acceptance and retain exclusive rights to your accepted piece for 90 days after publication. After that, we will archive your piece online and may include it in one of our print editions. Should you choose to reprint the piece in the future, please mention that your piece was originally published in Mud Season Review.

We pay authors and featured artists $50 for work that appears in our issues. For artists whose images are paired with writing, and for poets whose work appears in The Take: Mud Season Review, we offer payment of $15.

Submit your work here. 

Call for Submissions: MEMEZINE

 

Deadline: May 31, 2026 

Send any traditional or hybrid pieces that directly or indirectly engage with the intersections of humanity and technology. This includes (but is not limited to) memes, political/current events, viral content, trends, social media, pop/internet culture, technology, and any other work that blurs the lines between art, literature, and content. Gift us your best and your worst because we want to explore all facets of participation in this digital landscape.

If you’re not sure whether your work fits, check out some of our features (linked above!) and our issues.

We also highly encourage you to read our ABOUT page if this is your first time submitting, thank you.

✱ LENGTH

For poetry, send 1-3 pieces in one document, at a maximum of five (5) pages total

For prose, send 1-3 pieces in one document, at a maximum of five (5) pages total

For art, send 1-5 pieces

✱ PAYMENT

MEMEZINE now pays $10.00 to each curated issue contributor (must have Venmo or PayPal).

✱ RESPONSE TIME

Submissions typically receive a response in 1-2 months. If you have not received a response two months after your submission date, please query at:

memezinelit@gmail.com

If we pass on your piece, you are welcome to submit different work in the next open reading period (Fall 2026).

Submissions are always free, but we also offer a $3 expedited response (<1 week) for folks who wish to support MEMEZINE contributor payments and running costs.

✱ ARE SIMULTANEOUS SUMBISSIONS OKAY?

Fine and dandy! Just withdraw in Duosuma or email us if it’s picked up somewhere else (we’ll tell you congrats!).

✱ IS PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED WORK OKAY?

Previously published work is cool with us—work that has only appeared on your social media or personal blog may be submitted any time. If we accept your work, we ask that you grant us first serial rights until publication, and then all rights revert back to you.

NOTE: If the work has appeared in a curated publication, we ask that you wait one year since its original publication date. Please share the original publisher in your cover letter so we can give credit.

✱ WE DO NOT ACCEPT….

…work that is offensive to historically marginalized groups.

…work that is assisted by AI or generated by AI.

✱ HARD SELLS

ABAB rhyme scheme

Excerpts from genre manuscripts

Writing that grossly exceeds our length requirements

✱ QUESTIONS?

If you have any questions or are unable to use Duosuma, please email us at:

memezinelit@gmail.com 

Submit you work here.

Call for Submissions: Dog Named Dog Press

 

Our submission period is
Open. April 6, 2026 - April 25, 2026.

If your work lives in the space between genre and literary, if it moves, carries weight, and has a plot—we want to read it.

Dog Named Dog Press is seeking short fiction and other media for our quarterly publication.

What We’re Looking For

PRINT CONTENT

Short Stories
Word count: 3,000–5,500 words

Any genre is welcome, but we’re sniffing out work with forward motion, earned endings, with flawed and complicated people—and we like when the writing sits with them rather than looking down on them. Our tastes lean more hard-boiled literary than anything overly flowery or purely atmospheric. We’re generally not a home for twist endings, slow meditations, or prose that draws attention away from the story.

We tend to favor crime and crime-adjacent fiction, but we’re open to sci-fi, westerns, and horror. Keep in mind:

Sci-fi — More Blade Runner, Robocop; less Ender’s Game.

Westerns — Elmore Leonard energy; also Unforgiven, True Grit.

Horror — The Frighteners, Midnight Mass; not Art the Clown.

Fantasy — If you can make fantasy hard-boiled, please send it.

Payment: $35 + contributor’s copy

What We’re Not Looking For:

• Novel excerpts (unless requested)

• Children’s fiction

• Young Adult

• Memoir or personal essays

• Erotica

• Full-length manuscripts

• Translations

We are not interested in stories in which violence toward women, children, animals, or marginalized groups is the point of the story or is glorified. These elements can exist, but they shouldn’t be the focus.

Essays, Reviews, Interviews

By request only. If you have an idea, feel free to pitch it, but we do not accept unsolicited submissions in these categories.

Other Media

Comics
Growing up, my grandmother clipped newspaper comics for me every morning, and that left a soft spot for them. DNDP is interested in standalone comics and 4-part serials—funny or serious. I can’t fully define what we’re looking for, but a 4-part Columbo-style mystery sounds amazing, as would a Zits/Ziggy/Cathy-style one-panel strip about the struggles of being a writer/artist, or something that pokes fun at genre tropes while embracing them. We’re suckers for meta writing and humor. We are not interested in political cartoons.

Payment:

$25 — one-panel comic

 $100 — four-part serial (submit all four parts together)

 Contributor’s copy (one per accepted piece/part)

Poetry
If your poetry feels like it would be a good fit with DNDP, send 3–5 poems. I’m not even sure how to describe what we want—give me the David Lynch version of Robert Penn Warren, Hafiz, and John Berryman. Give me poetry that sounds like Nick Cave and Tom Waits.

Payment: $10 per accepted poem + contributor’s copy

Online Content

DNDP Quarterly will also have an online component featuring recurring segments. Selected online pieces may appear in the print edition of the current issue.

Flash Fiction
Word count: 800–1,000 words
Prompt for this Open Call:
We want complete stories told quickly about the eternal Sisyphus—ordinary people keeping their heads down in a broken world. No, really, break reality, but have the characters living mundanely inside it.

Examples:

A mechanic still opens their shop every morning, even though aliens landed six months ago in the next state and no one cares anymore.

A medical breakthrough conquered death, and now rent never stops coming due—so you still have three back-to-back meetings.

Robots walk among us for so long now that we’re over it, but your boss is an android and schedules mandatory trust-building exercises.

Your town suffers a ritualized murder spree every Thursday the 12th, but you can’t miss a paycheck and have to work the midnight shift at the gas station, as if it’s any other day.

Frogs have rained from the sky every April for six years, and no one knows why, and tonight you’re helping a friend look for their runaway kid.

Break reality however you want—but let it be our reality with characters still pushing their boulders, having to go through their lives as if everything is normal. It’s not on them to solve the broken world, they just exist in it.

Payment: $20 per story (+ contributor’s copy if selected for print)

The Haunting of DNDP

Word count: 500–1,000 words
As writers, a lot of us are haunted by things we encountered once in a movie, TV, song, or writing that stuck with us, and we couldn’t ever shake. And if put under a microscope, our writing would show hints of this haunting. If you have a scene from a movie or show, a specific camera shot, an encounter with a song, a needle drop, anything that grabbed you and never let go, we’d love to hear it. Note: This isn’t a review or a retelling of the scene—we want to know why it haunts you so it can haunt us too.

Payment: $15 per essay (+ contributor’s copy if selected for print)

I’d Watch That for a Dollar
Word count: 500–900 words
We all know that moment:

“You’ve never seen [Insert the same movie everyone has this reaction with]?!”

Maybe we add it to our list of Things We’ll Try to Get Around To. A list that only grows, never shrinks. But half the time, that moment makes us want to watch it less.

Most days we don’t have the bandwidth for something new, heavy, or culturally urgent. We want to sink into the couch, turn our brains off, and throw on the fast-food of streaming. Comfort junk.

We’re looking for hidden gems and guilty pleasures — the movies or shows you’d never pay full price for, but you’d happily watch if it’s on Tubi or buried in the clearance bin at Blockbuster. Not ironic love but real affection. The stuff you reach for when you’re hungover, or couch-locked, or needing something that asks absolutely nothing of you.

We don’t want the latest hit or anything trending.

We want the bones buried in your backyard that you dig up when needed and think, damn, this still rules.

Guidelines:

One movie/show per entry

One entry per person per submission period

Maximum 900 words

Must be available on a streaming service (not rental-only)

Write with love, not snark

Payment: $15 per essay (+ contributor’s copy if selected for print)

Columbo Corner
Word count: 1,000–3,000 words
Dog Named Dog got its namesake from Columbo, so talking about our love for the show is something we always want to talk about—but we don’t want standard reviews of an episode, we want a breakdown of your favorite episode through your eyes, through your writing, through your experience. We’re not interested in beat-for-beat retelling.

Payment: $15 per essay (+ contributor’s copy if selected for print)

More info and submission addresses here.