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Driftwood Press – Issue 9.1

Driftwood Press‘s latest short stories “Wing Breaker” by Rachel Phillippo and “Spanish Soap Operas Killed My Mother” by Dailihana Alfonseca take you from brutal arctic traditions to the cultural traumas of migrants in America. This issue also collects some of the most insightful and harrowing poetry being written today; these poems delve into illness, motherhood, religious pressure, and much more. Wrapping up the issue are visual arts and comics by Io Weurich, Kelsey M. Evans, SAMO Collective, Jim Still-Pepper, Andrew White, Kimball Anderson, & Casey Jo Stohrer. Now at the Driftwood Press website.

Biology and Connection: An Interview with Lauren Taylor Grad

The Woven Tale Press – Volume 9 Number 9, 2021

Lauren Taylor Grad’s work was featured in Woven Tale Press Volume XI Number 9. Jennifer Nelson, WTP feature writer interviewed Taylor Grad recently on the meaning and thought processes behind several of her works along with her pursuit of an MFA.

From using found items to create sculptures to utilizing her undergraduate work in biology to create paintings, Taylor Grad’s work is diverse. One of the most interesting pieces is Tethered which is comprised of used clothing made to create two concrete boulders and a connecting line between them. She also created a video art piece to accompany the sculpture about moving these boulders around a curving path.

Nelson: Why did you feel it was important to earn an MFA?

The decision to go to graduate school and earn my Masters in Fine Arts was not one that I took lightly. It is a huge investment, both in time and money, and I wanted to be sure that it was the right path for me to take before I made that leap. I personally really enjoy academia; I think that the amount of growth and nurturing that occurs in an individual throughout art school in such a short amount of time is transformative, and unlike anything that you can get elsewhere.

Taylor Grad also talked about taking time off after earning her undergraduate degree to try out being a living artist and other avenues before ultimately going back to earn her MFA so that she can also become an art instructor.

Read the full interview here and look at some of Taylor Grad’s amazing work.

Cutleaf – Issue 1 Volume 17

Issue 17 of Cutleaf is live. In this issue, Melissa Helton shares two poems beginning with “The Teenager Has Gone Witchy.” Hanna Ferguson uses food to recount important moments in her life in “An In-Progress Cookbook of Recipes That Stick to My Ribs.” And Joan Wickersham prepares for Halloween with the best of intentions in the short story “The Subterranean Calendar.” Learn about this issue’s images at the Cutleaf website.

Cutleaf – Issue 1 Volume 16

In this issue of Cutleaf, Peggy Xu remembers the joy of culinary whiplash that results when food and culture combine in “Yam’Tcha.” David B. Prather shares three poems beginning with one that takes us into the beautiful mind of “The Boy in the High School Science Room.” And Ray Trotter depicts a scene of speculation and frustration when two men wonder what’s inside a locked workshop in “Scavengers.” Learn about this issue’s images at the Cutleaf website.

Cutleaf – Issue 1 Volume 13

In this issue, Jesse Graves delves into that complicated space where family connects with history and place in three poems that begin with “An Exile.” Ace Boggess tells the story of the winding road the carries eight men to a West Virginia penitentiary in “Welcome to Rock Haul.” Amy Wright remembers the summer after her brother died from cancer, and the line of communication that opened, in “Life After Death,” an excerpt from her forthcoming book Paper Concert: A Conversation in the Round. Read more at the Cutleaf website.

Ruminate – Summer 2021

Our summer issue includes many examples of lives forged by experience. The characters in these poems and stories are shaped and revealed by what they endure. There is heat and pressure in Alex Pickens’ “Derecho.” Shamarang Silas’s poem “The Weight of Trains,” inquires, “What is worship if not the desire to offer yourself to the fire / & everything you have ever loved?” Find out more at the Ruminate website.

About Place Journal – May 2021

“Geographies of Justice,” edited by Alexis Lathem with Richard Cambridge and Charles Coe. An extraordinary testament to extraordinary times: includes poetry from Susan Deer Cloud, Tammy Melody Gomez, Richard Hoffmann, Jacqueline Johnson, Petra Kuppers, and Danielle Wolffe; nonfiction from Teow Lim Goh, Andréana Elise Lefton, David Mura, Nicole Walker, and Catherine Young. Find more contributors at the About Place Journal website.

Still Point Arts Quarterly – Spring 2021

This issue’s theme is “My Deep Love of Place.” Featured writers include Melodie Corrigall, Suzanne Finney, Catherine Young, Amy Cotler, Jeri Ann Griffith, Lawrence Gregory, Sue Schuerman, Cayce Osborne, Penny Milam, David Denny, William Bless, Barbara Cole, Rosalie Sanara Petrouske, and Teresa H. Klepac. Featured artists include Catherine L. Schweig, Walt Hug, Birgit Gutsche, MJ Edwards, and Barbara Anne Kearney. Find more info at the Still Point Arts Quarterly website.

Blackout Poems by Jennifer Sperry Steinorth

Magazine Review by Katy Haas.

The Winter 2020 issue of the Missouri Review includes a selection of blackout poetry by Jennifer Sperry Steinorth. These poems move beyond the traditional blackout poem, though, and move into a realm beyond, each poem a well-crafted work of art. The variety in style is inspiring as she demonstrates the creative ways one can manipulate text. The art speaks as much as the selected words do. Each turn of the page reveals something inventive and exciting, a treasured find in this issue.

Hole in the Head Review – Feb 2021

Hole in The Head Review begins their second year with this new issue. Visit for new work by Tim Benjamin, Richard Jones, S. Stephanie, Connor Doyle, Ashley Mallick, Larkin Warren, Eva Goetz, Ron Riekki, Beth Copeland, Roger Camp, Heather Newman, Tom Barlow, Dennis Herrell, Lily Anna Erb, Dick Altman, Glen Armstrong, Erin Wilson, Yoni Hammer-Kossov, Matthew Moment, Cynthia Galaher, Lisa Zimmerman, Christy Sheffield, Tilly Woodward, and more.

Cleaver Magazine – Winter 2020

In the newest issue of Cleaver Magazine find: poetry by Meggie Royer, Amy Beth Sisson, Heikki Huotari, and more; nonfiction by Jinna Han, Christina Berke, Susan Hamlin, Claire Rudy Foster, and others; a visual narrative by Michael Green; short stories by Dylan Cook, L.L. Babb, and Mike Nees; flash by Steve Gergley, B. Bilby Barton, Darlene Eliot, and more; and paintings by Morgan Motes.

Persephone’s Daughters – No. 7

Issue Seven is three issues in one—a poetry issue, a prose issue, and an art issue. This is our largest issue to date, filled with art, poetry, and prose from domestic and sexual violence survivors, child abuse survivors, and harassment victims. Work by Taylor Drake, Sky Dai, Emma Jokinen, Elena Fite, Siri Espy, Isabella Neblett, Charlotte Kane, Carly Hall, Melanie Ward, Rachael Gay, Mae Herring, Miriam Leibowitz, Mars Rightwildish, Ranjeet Singh, and many more. We were also fortunate to be able to interview Lori Greene for the issue, who created the artwork for the United States’s first permanent memorial to sexual violence survivors.

Months To Years – Fall 2020

The latest issue of Months To Years is out. It includes yet another fantastic roster of talented writers reflecting on grief and loss from diverse perspectives. Work by Zan Bockes, John Q. McDonald, Nancy Morgan, Rosa Angelica Garcia, Co Bauman, Susan Rothstein, Megeen R. Mulholland, Paul Sohar, Stewart Lindh, Bruce Gorden, Michal Mahgerefteh, Karen Storm, Linda Ankrah-Dove, Charlene Stegman Moskal, Marjorie Stamm Rosenfeld, Elizabeth Haukaas, C.T. Holte, Beth Hope-Cushey, Kim Malinowski, Liza Bernstein, Lucy Meynell, and Charlie Morris.

The Georgia Review – Winter 2020

The latest issue of The Georgia Review is out with new work from Terrance Hayes, Arthur Sze, Jenny Boully, Samuel R. Delany, Maud Casey, and many other voices. The issue features the 2020 winner of the Review’s Loraine Williams Poetry Prize, selected by Ilya Kaminsky, as well as three finalists. It also showcases a selection of translated poems by Taiwanese author Sun Tzu-ping, and a long poem by the late Molly Brodak, annotated by her widower, Blake Butler. Moreover, there is an art portfolio of UGA Alumna Meghann Riepenhoff’s work, the artist interviewed by Georgia Review editor Douglas Carlson.

At Home In The Dark With Carol Morris’s ‘Into The Lucky Dark’

Guest Post by Susan Kay Anderson

Into The Lucky Dark by Carol Morris, who is part of the Diane Wakoski circle, is much like being invited to coffee at a friend’s house where every time you go there you can be yourself and when you leave you feel like more yourself than ever before. Morris believes that life is a struggle but to read her poems and look at her utterly delightful artwork in this book, it would seem that life is also a place that we seem to haunt long before getting to the ghostly stage of things. This takes a bit of getting used to. It takes a while to read Morris’s poems because to languish in their harsh settings of bars and other meetings/gatherings is to feel the freeze, feel the edges of being an outsider even to oneself and then find the self in the touchstones of such leaving: “Houses in which my talents were useless” (from “A June Divorce”) to finding art and abstractions which make concrete sense. Continue reading “At Home In The Dark With Carol Morris’s ‘Into The Lucky Dark’”

Split Rock Review – Issue 15

The new issue of Split Rock Review features work by Ted Kooser, David Axelrod, Lauren Camp, William Woolfitt, Celia Bland, and many more writers and artists, including fiction by Adrian Markle; nonfiction by Anna Oberg and Wendy Weiger; a comic by Don Swartzentruber; art & photography by Aaron Burden, Leah Dockrill, Natalie Gillis, and more; and poetry by Ellen Rogers, Connie Post, Jenny Wong, Rebecca Yates, Emry Trantham, and more.

About Place Journal – Oct 2020

“Works of Resistance, Resilience” is comprised of poetry, fiction, nonfiction and visual art by 83 writers and artists. The issue has five themed sections that explore what it means to live in America at this time of profound reckoning. What does resistance look like? Can resistance contain love, power and empathy? In this age of collective anxiety, the writers and artists from around the world attempt to answer what it means to live and survive during the Covid-19 pandemic and beyond. The Works of Resistance, Resilience will rekindle our desire to learn and thrive and to discover what is needed to change our relationship to the earth and to each other. More info at the About Place Journal website.

The Georgia Review – Fall 2020

The Georgia Review’s Fall 2020 issue is out with new work from Kaitlyn Greenidge, Wayne Koestenbaum, Sally Wen Mao, Charles Baxter, Marianne Boruch, Yona Harvey, and many other compelling voices, both emerging and long-established. Special features include a portfolio of artwork from the High Museum of Art’s exhibition Picture the Dream: The Story of the Civil Rights Movement Through Children’s Books and a translation of Vinod Kumar Shukla’s masterful short story “College.”

Leaping Clear – Fall 2020

Leaping Clear - logo

Take the time to enjoy and be nourished by the art and writing in this new issue of Leaping Clear. There is humor, poignancy, power, ecstasy, calm, and beauty to be found in essays by Elizabeth Fletcher, Liz Woz, Ranjani Rao, and more; fiction by Taffeta Chime; and poetry by Alan Cohen, Carla Sarett, Fran Markover, J. P. White, Linda Parsons, Sandra Fees, Wayne Lee, and more.

Overlooked Beauty

Magazine Review by Katy Haas

Now more than ever it’s important to find the beauty in whatever is around us. As writers, as artists, and as humans struggling through a traumatic period of time, it’s necessary to find bright spots. The Fall 2020 issue of Still Point Arts Quarterly puts this into practice, the theme of the issue being “The Secret Life of Objects.”

Throughout the pages, writers and artists look at what’s around them and capture their beauty. Adrienne Stevenson writes an ode to a “Kitchen Timer,” an appliance one doesn’t have to think much about until it’s gone. Kathleen Miller draws pared-down sketches of telephones, boats, pitchers, eliminating the details to follow Georgia O’Keeffe’s sentiment of “get[ting] at the real meaning of things.” Most of MJ Edwards’s compelling photography focuses on treasures of trash found on the beach, as they wonder about the “untold stories” the objects carry with them.

Art can be found in the everyday items around us, the objects easily overlooked. Don’t forget to look around you and find the beauty and inspiration they can hold.

Still Point Arts Quarterly – Fall 2020

The Fall 2020 issue homes in on “The Secret Life of Objects.” Featured artists include Cary Loving, Birgit Gutsche, Aaron M. Brown, Jeffrey Stoner, and more. Featured writers include Dawn Raffel, Judith Sornberger, Emily Uduwana, Kathleen Aponick, William Doreski, Keltie Zubko, Adrienne Stevenson, Susan Currie, and others. Find more info at the Still Point Arts Quarterly website.

Sponsor Spotlight :: Reunion: The Dallas Review

Reunion: The Dallas Review website screenshotOriginally titled Sojourn, Reunion: The Dallas Review is a literary magazine which has been publishing exceptional short fiction, drama, visual art, poetry, translation work, nonfiction, and interviews for over twenty years. Their mission is to cultivate the arts community in Dallas, Texas and promote the work of talented writers and artists both locally and around the world.

Reunion is published by The School of Arts & Humanities, home of the creative writing program of the University of Texas at Dallas. They publish an annual print volume as well as featuring a new piece of work monthly on their website. You can view past interviews with writers on their website as well.

Stop by their listing on NewPages to learn more.

Sponsor Spotlight :: Radar Poetry

Radar Poetry is an online literary magazine devoted to publishing poems from both established and emerging writers. The journal was founded in 2013 by Rachel Marie Patterson and Dara-Lyn Shrager. Each issue features pairings of poetry and visual art, selected by the editors and contributors. They seek to feature visual art that interprets, reimagines, or responds to the poem with which it appears.

Issues are published quarterly and the founders and editors also host workshops and retreats.

Each year, Radar Poetry hosts the Coniston Prize. This award is open to female-identifying poets writing in English. The prize is currently accepting submissions through September 1. This year’s judge is Ada Limón. The winning poet receives $1,500 and publication. $10 reading fee.

Issue 27, published in July, features poetry and art by Lauren Camp, Walker Evans, Jen Jabaily-Blackburn, Dante DiStefano, Honour Mack, Martha McCollough, Jack Delano, and more.

Stop by their listing on NewPages to learn more.

Sponsor Spotlight :: Rockvale Review: Bold & Vulnerable Poetry

Rockvale Review screenshotRockvale Review was founded in 2017 as an online journal devoted to “bold and vulnerable poetry.” They publish work from new, emerging, and established writers and feature image-driven poems that are hard-edged and finely crafted. They do offer optional print editions of their issues which are released in May and November of each year.

They have a unique feature where every poem accepted for publication is paired with a piece of art created by a Featured Artist. A Featured Musician will also craft music to respond to several of the poems in each issue. In doing so, Rockvale Review produces a journal that speaks beyond words, moving into the visual and auditory layers of the human spirit.

Their sixth issue was published in May 2020 and features work by Travis Stephens, Ivo Drury, Kate Deimling, Shannon Wolf, M.G. Hofmann, Wendy Drexler, and more. Stop by their listing at NewPages to learn more.

Cleaver Magazine – Summer 2020

This issue of Cleaver Magazine features art by Madeline Rile Smith, a visual narrative by Emily Steinberg, and an essay on the art of Jan Powell by Melanie Carden. Also in this issue: short stories by Reilly Joret, Elaine Crauder, Melissa Brook, and Marion Peters Denard; flash by Susan Tacent, Brenna Womer, Michelle Ephraim, Leonard Kress, and others; and poetry by Roy Bentley, Stella Hayes, and more.

Sponsor Spotlight :: Auroras & Blossoms Focuses on Positivity, Art, & Inspiration

Auroras & Blossoms 2020 NaPoWriMo Anthology coverAuroras & Blossoms is an electronic literary magazine launched in 2019 by co-founders Cendrine Marrouat and David Ellis. It is dedicated to promoting positive, uplifting, and inspirational poetry, poetry-graphy, short stories, 6-word stories, paintings, drawings, and photography. They feature poetry from adults as well as young writers ages 13-16. As they are a family-friend platform, no swear words, dirty words, politics, or erotica is allowed.

They also publish digital anthologies. Their first is the NaPoWriMo Anthology which contains poetry written throughout National Poetry Writing Month in April 2020 and features work by Donna Allard, Chandni Asnani, Maria L. Berg, Jamie Brian, Jimena Cerda, Jaewon Chang, Ravichandra Chittampalli, Sandra Christensen, Mimi DiFrancesca, Fiona D’Silva, Kate Duff, Judy Dykstra-Brown, Amanda M. Eifert, Stacie Eirich, David Ellis, Michael Erickson, Deveree Extein, Jack M. Freedman, Alicia Grimshaw, Jenny Hayut, Patrick Jennings, Liam Kennedy, Ting Lam, Rose Loving, Cendrine Marrouat, Michele Mekel, Ally Nellmapius, William Reynolds, Madhumita Sarangi, Anna Schoenbach, Julie A. Sellers, Jonathan Shipley, Dorian J. Sinnott, Krupali Trivedi, Angela van Son, Michele Vecchitto, Penny Wilkes, and Gemma Wiseman. Their next anthology will be PoArtMo which stands for Positive Art Month and Positive Art Moves.

Stop by their listing at NewPages to learn more.

Sponsor Spotlight :: Months To Years

Months to Years Summer 2019 IssueFounded in 2017 by Renata and Tim Louwers, Months To Years is an online literary magazine exploring mortality and terminal illness. Both editors experienced the loss of their first spouses due to bladder cancer and early onset Alzheimer’s, inspiring them to co-found this journal. They wanted to create a literary space where those experiencing grief can reflect on their experiences through literature and art. The name of the journal is a phrase often used with terminally ill patients as the doctor’s best estimate of expected life span.

Months To Years publishes nonfiction, poetry, photography, and art that explores grief, death, and dying on a quarterly basis. They are now back after a brief hiatus and accepting submissions on a continuous basis whether you are a terminally ill person, a doctor, someone who suffered a loss, a caregiver, or someone simply contemplating mortality.

Stop by their listing at NewPages to learn more about this journal.

Driftwood Press – Issue 7.2

Featured in our latest issue is the 2020 In-House Contest winning story “Trash Man” by Jessica Holbert alongside another story, “The Taxidermist,” by Seth Tucker. The poetry in this issue explores the emotional and physical connections to different geographies and technologies, from abandoned lighthouses and frost-covered pastures to half-truth news coverage and Harry Potter. Wrapping up the issue are visual arts and comics by Coz Frimpong, Geoffrey Detrani, Yi-hui Huang, Aimee Cozza, and Jason Hart. Read more at the Driftwood Press website.

Sponsor Spotlight: Club Plum Literary Journal

Club Plum logoClub Plum Literary Journal is a new quarterly online literary magazine founded in 2019. They have released three issues to date with a focus on flash fiction, prose poetry, and art from both emerging and established writers. Their aim is to act as a “temporary entrance into a literary world of empathy, art, and sound. A place to take and to give.”

They keep their site clean and free of ads and distracting elements so the reader’s experience is focused on the absorbing tales and imagery unravelling in voices either understated or lyrical, but always powerful. “This is a safe place. Our hearts have been pummeled; our minds have been toyed with. We see clearly now. This is a place for thinkers and doers. A place to turn our pain into wondrous works of art.”

Check out their basic submission information and full publisher’s description at their listing on NewPages.

The Georgia Review – Summer 2020

The Georgia Review‘s latest issue features new writing from Garrett Hongo, Aimee Nezhukumatathil, Laura van den Berg, A. E. Stallings, and many other exciting voices! Original translations of poetic works by Hisham Bustani and Shuzo Takiguchi. Illustrated features on the theme “Shelter in Place,” by Lindsey Bailey, Kaytea Petro, and Bishakh Som. Cover art and portfolio by Doron Langberg. This issue is not to be missed—read selected online features today!

The Shore – Summer 2020

The summer issue of The Shore features dazzling poetry by: Catherine Pierce, Kim Harvey, Beth Gylys, Joshua Garcia, Sara Moore Wagner, Kristi Maxwell, Dillon Thomas Jones, Matthew Bruce, Lorrie Ness, C.C.Russell, Travis Truax, Stanley Princewill McDaniels, Njoku Nonso, Erin Rodoni, Phillip Sterling, William Doreski, and more.

Still Point Arts Quarterly – Summer 2020

This issue’s theme is “Making a Mark,” and the current art exhibition explores this theme. Featured artists include David Sapp, Mary Macey Butler, Cary Loving, and others. Featured writers include Karla Van Vliet, Wally Swist, Paula Penna, Dave Gregory, Bethany Bruno, Gergory Stephens, Mary Lane Potter, Roudri Bandyopadhyay, Sarah Brown Weitzman, Mark Tulin, Joe Kowalski, and more. Find more info at the Still Point Arts Quarterly website.

The Gettysburg Review – 33.4

The Autumn issue of The Gettysburg Review is out. The issue features paintings by Jared Small, fiction by Jennifer Anne Moses, Jared Hanson, Darrell Kinsey, and Sean Bernard; essays by Andrew Cohen, K. Robert Schaeffer, and Christopher Wall; poetry by Jill McDonough, Max Seifert, K. A. Hays, Albert Goldbarth, Mary B. Moore, R. T. Smith, Jill Bialosky, Katharine Whitcomb, Corey Marks, Kimberly Johnson, Margaret Ray, Danusha Laméris, Linda Pastan, Christopher Bakken, Christopher Howell, and Margaret Gibson.

Sponsor Spotlight :: Del Sol Review

Originally started in 1997 under the name of “Editor’s Picks,” Del Sol Review has transformed from highlighting select work from print journals to being its very own literary magazine. Contributors include Maxine Chernoff, Paul West, Linh Dinh, Holly Iglesias, Deborah Olin Unferth, Michael Martone, and Daniel Bosch.

Del Sol Review accepts unsolicited works of speculative fiction, poetry, prose poetry, creative nonfiction, short stories, and flash fiction year-round. They love works containing unique and interesting subject matter.

Their latest issue, No. 24, is the Richard Basehart Issue. This contains fiction by Joe Kowalski, Zeke Jarvis, Glen Pourciau, Debbie Ann Ice, Evan Steuber, Jenny Drummey, Andrew Stancek, Richard Leise, Risa Mickenberg, Joseph Couchet, Robert Miltner, Ron Riekki, and Mark Walling; and poetry by Michael Salcman, Nancy Botkin, Wendy Barker, Hilary Sideris, Rich Ives, and Nish Amarnath.

I love the little snippets they put with their issues: “Carnivores. Astonomy. Zsa Zsa Gabor Geeks.” or “Innocent, flight, teeth, yecch, and more!”