Poetry Submissions:
1) Please submit no more than 3 poems during a single submission period.
2)
This is our most popular genre so please submit only your best work; fewer than 5% are accepted.
3) We are not interested in religious, patriotic, or "love conquers all" platitudes.
· Instead, we want poetry that is thoughtful, brutally revised, and fresh.
4) Please submit only one poem per file.
5) A very brief (50 words or less) bio should be included with your submission.
· Place your bio blurb inside your submission, at the end of the document. |
Our Poetry Editor Advises:
"In poetry, I look for original, creative imagery that conveys something significant in a fresh way. The poems you submit may inspire by demonstrating their unique style of personal voice through the elements of purposeful ambiguity, symbolism, and metaphor. The presences of specificity in the language of the verse should unfold with an emotional power and an enlightened awareness: a moment of knowing."
Our Managing Editor Advises:
"Poetry is language distilled. More than any other genre, every single word must work—I'm talking double shift, three jobs and four kids kind of work. There is simply no place for laziness in poetry, either in the crafting of it or in the words, sentences, and stanzas which comprise it. Too many people think poetry grants poetic license: that the poet can be sloppy, vague, or purposefully abstract—what poet Steve Kowit calls 'abscure'—and call the results poetry.The opposite must be true if a poem is to work effectively, and if it is worth anyone else's time. When I read a poem I am looking for something real, something accessible, something concrete, and something with an emotional payoff. " |
