Category: Poetry

Poetry

Taking Submissions: The Lorelei Signal 2025 Oct – Dec Issue Window

Submission Window: April 15th – May 15th, 2025
Payment: $15.00 for short stories $5.00 for poems and flash (<1000 wds) fiction pieces. $5.00 for reprints
Theme: SF/Fantasy stories that feature strong / complex female characters

The Lorelei Signal is a quarterly SF/Fantasy electronic magazine – one that will feature strong / complex female characters. This does not mean your female character has to be the main hero or villain in the story. What it does mean is no shrinking violets, or women who serve only to get into trouble so the male hero can rescue them.


Each issue I hope to publish:
7 short stories, 1 flash fiction piece and 2 poems
that meet the following guidelines:

My primary guideline is simple:
Write a good fantasy story with strong/complex characters.

What I am NOT looking for – erotica / slash / or other such stories.
Although well written love scenes that are IMPORTANT to the story will be considered on a story-by-story basis.

(more…)

Taking Submissions: Tales from the Silver City Saloon

Deadline: May 16th, 2025
Payment: Contributors Copy (as this is a charity anthology outside of that.)
Theme: Humorous, weird western science fiction

This is a humorous, weird western science fiction anthology, created in honor of Ken Rand. Ken was a fixture at Utah writing events, whether it was workshops, conventions, LTUE, or just hanging out. He’s perhaps best known for his The 10% Solution writing book, where he helps writers learn how to effectively edit their own work in order to greatly improve their stories. He also wrote a lot of weird westerns, science fiction, fantasy, and horror short works throughout his career, and almost all of his stories had humor in them.

We want humorous, weird west, science fiction tales and poetry (as long as the poetry tells a story, and long-form poetry would be awesome). Think The Adventures of Briscoe County Jr., The Wild Wild West TV series, and Cowboys and Aliens. Make your stories fun to read, make the characters interesting, and make us grin. The tales must have heart, must be solid stories, and must be positive in their outlook.

About the charity and more details for submissions:

(more…)

Taking Submissions: Winter Lore Book 3: Aurora: Tales of Winter Dreams

Deadline: May 13th, 2025
Payment: $20 for original fiction. $10 for poetry. $5 for reprints, $5 for short articles, poems and spells on winter rites, traditions and rituals – Payment and a contributor’s copy for US authors
Theme: Stories of how winter relates to rest and rejuvenation and refinement of dreams involving fantasy, folklore, and magic

Winter Lore Book 3: Aurora: Tales of Winter Dreams:
Submission Open March 25 to May 13, 2025
Word count 2,000 to 6,000

Pay: $20 for original fiction

$10 for poetry

$5 for reprints

$5 for short articles, poems and spells on winter rites, traditions and rituals

Payment and a contributors copy

Paperback for US residence

Ebook for Non-US residence

(more…)

Ongoing Submissions: Kinpaurak Magazine

Payment: $5 per work
Theme: Fiction, poetry, artwork that deals with the Esoteric, Absurd, and Sublime (definitions below.)

THE ESOTERIC – Hidden. Occult. Secret. Mystical. Unknown.

THE ABSURD – Meaningless. Chaos. Nonsense. Ridiculous. Paradox. Existential.

THE SUBLIME – Awe. Vastness. Beauty. Terror. Overwhelming. Grandeur.

We accept all genres—fiction, nonfiction, poetry, philosophical monologues, etc. However, nothing over 2,000 words.

  • Fiction/Nonfiction: Up to 2000 words (flash, short stories, experimental prose welcome).
  • Poetry: Up to one quadrillion poems per submission (not exceeding 2000 words). Any form or style.
  • Essays: Up to 2000 words.
  • Hybrid Work: No rules, I guess. If it doesn’t fit anywhere else, send it here.
  • Visual Art: We accept a range of 2D and 3D artworks. PNG, JPG, or TIFF. Dimensions wise, preferably 8.5×11 inches (portrait) or 11×8.5 inches (landscape).
  • Auditory Art: Noise, ambient, and electronic manipulations are most wanted. WAV or MP3 (320 kbps preferred). Up to 10 minutes (shorter pieces encouraged). Accompany a description, 150–300 words, explaining the concept, technique, and relevance to Kinpaurak’s themes. Please refer to our FAQ for more information.

(more…)

Taking Submissions: SpecPoVerse Second 2025 Window

Submission Window: May 1st – June 30th, 205
Payment: $5
Theme: Speculative Poetry

SpecPoVerse accepts poems with or without known formalism and also experimental forms. An illustrated poem in which the illustration was created by the poet is also acceptable; this must be submitted as a .pdf file with the embedded illustration.

(more…)

Taking Submissions: Eternal Haunted Summer: Summer Solstice 2025

Submission Window: May 1st – June 1st, 2025
Payment: $5
Theme: Poetry or short fiction about the Gods and Goddesses and heroes of the world’s many Pagan/polytheist traditions that somehow features Music

Summer Solstice 2025: Music. Submission Period: 1 May through 1 June 2025. Jazz and blues. Rock and opera. Ballads and filk songs. Music has been an integral element of human creativity and culture since we first learned to carve holes into bones. Send us your best poems, short stories, and essays about music — in all its forms — from a Pagan/polytheist, witchy, and mythological point of view. Send us poems about the duel between Apollo and Marsyas, Bragi wooing Idun, and Pan stalking a poacher with madness-inducing pipe music. Send us short stories about a desperate musician making a crossroads deal with Dionysus, a composer praying to Hymen for inspiration, an archaeologist uncovering a temple and sacred instruments of Kothar-wa-Khasis. Send us essays about Väinämöinen as archetypal musician, Mozart’s opera Apollo et Hyacinthus, and the rise of the modern Pagan music scene.

(more…)

Taking Submissions: Saturday Mourning Television

Deadline: June 30th, 2025
Payment: $35 and a contributors copy
Theme: Short horror fiction inspired by early morning kids TV

Send us your best short horror fiction inspired by early morning kids TV for our next anthology, Saturday Mourning Television. Tune us in to something scary based on any decade you like: the educational/bizarre 1960’s & 70’s, the advert-packed 80’s, the radical 90’s, the wayward & wacky 2000’s or anything beyond. Even web-based entertainment is fair game. And don’t limit yourself to tales involving kids, what about parents, or performers & hosts, workers behind the scenes, even animated creations. Let your imagination go wild, and remember not to sit too close to the screen!

(more…)

Taking Submissions: Promised Protagonists Anthology

Deadline: April 30th, 2025
Payment: Contributor’s copy
Theme: The YA stories you wish you had as a kid with someone like you as the protagonist
Note: This anthology is looking for diverse characters. All genres are welcome, though I suspect Fantasy and SciFi will be an easier sell than horror or anything dark

Submissions open March 15 for the first Promised Protagonists anthology!

This collection of diverse fiction, poetry, and art will be published in print (paperback and potentially hardcover), as well as in ebook format, in the second half of 2025.

Submissions will be open from March 15 to April 30. The Google Form for submissions will appear below once the window opens.

Unlike our usual submission periods, we will NOT be offering detailed feedback on all anthology submissions due to the expected volume! Particularly for submissions that reach the final rounds of consideration, we may give a few lines of feedback; if you aren’t interested, let us know in the form’s comment box.

Overall Guidelines

We want the stories you wish you had as a kid! Send us your quirky short fiction, your thoughtful fantasy, or anything that shows that you—yes, you!—can be the protagonist in your own story.

We want diverse characters and diverse stories, the perspectives that are too often left out of the general narrative, and pieces that remind young readers that they deserve to take up space and have their own adventures.

To get a better sense of the sort of work we’ve published in the past, check out Promised Protagonists Issue 1, Issue 2, and Issue 3 (linked here).

Don’t self-reject—if in doubt, submit! We want to see your work, and it won’t get published if it never leaves your computer.

(more…)