Variant Literature

Our poetry, fiction, and creative nonfiction doors are now open in Submittable. baltimorereview.org

Gates are Open! We’re accepting submissions for our Open Issue!

Gates are Open! We’re accepting submissions for our Open Issue!
Send us your best poems, fiction, or nonfiction!

Deadline: March 15
Link: ironhorse.submittable.com

Join us in congratulating our Brooklyn Poets Fellows for the winter 2026 season! 🎉 Congrats as well to our finalists! 👏👏 mailchi.mp/brooklynpoet...

Williams places his characters in environments disguised as warm, as home, as temporary hiding place, and asks the reader to see the contrast or likeness to the sometimes desolate or uninhabitable landscape of the snowy mountains or forgotten towns. Readers will relate to Williams' characters and their discontent, their reaction to the discomfort of these situations. They will recognize the moment of disconnect between the couples or friends, and feel like they were there to witness weighty moments with these characters. That's Williams' power with language and characters, one felt in the body even as an observer.

Excerpt from @suzyeynon.bsky.social’s review of my upcoming collection, “The Divide.” @variantlit.bsky.social

Check out @suzyeynon.bsky.social’s excellent review of @pahoehoe.bsky.social’s THE DIVIDE!💙📚

Thank you, @suzyeynon.bsky.social at @variantlit.bsky.social for the insightful review of my upcoming story collection, “The Divide,” from Cornerstone Press!

Review of The Divide: Stories by Evan Morgan Williams Evan Morgan Williams’ latest book, The Divide (Cornerstone Press February 2026), is a collection of short fiction rooted in the Mountain West. The stories collected here center on characters who fa…

New! Variant Lit’s Managing Long Form Fiction Editor @suzyeynon.bsky.social reviews The Divide by Evan Morgan Williams (@pahoehoe.bsky.social), out with Cornerstone Press in February.

variantlit.com/review-of-th...

We are still accepting submissions for The Big Moose Prize! Send us your unpublished novel via Submittable—submission details, past winners, and a look into this year's judging panel can be found on our website, or at the link below.

blacklawrencepress.com/submissions-...

Love that Sharon Kennedy-Noelle used her project to give youth a voice

Excellent and edifying interview

Poetry as a Means of Survival: A Conversation with Sharon Kennedy-Nolle Sharon Kennedy-Nolle is the author of the chapbook Black Wick: Selected Elegies (Variant Literature, 2021), which was a semifinalist for the 2018 Tupelo Snowbound Chapbook Contest and a 2020 Chapbo…

In our latest interview,
Sharon Kennedy-Nolle reflects on writing, witness, and the forms poetry can take when direct experience is unavailable.

Read the interview between Sharon Kennedy-Nolle and @megjnic.bsky.social on Variant's Variety Pack blog:

variantlit.com/sharon-kenne...

⚠️ DASHBOARD AWARDS ANNOUNCEMENT⚠️

#writingcommunity unite!

We wanna give out 3 awards to poetic pieces published in 2025 in OTHER online litmags!

Deadline: 1/31/26.

Writing Peers, Readers, & Editors can ALL nominate via Google Form: buff.ly/FMfhtG5

Rules & Details: buff.ly/vdm5FlB

⬇️ ⬇️

Alex Espinoza, the fiction judge for phoebe’s 2026 Spring Contest! Learn more in the post below ⬇️

Diane Seuss, the poetry judge for phoebe’s 2026 Spring Contest! Learn more in the post below ⬇️

Excerpts from the Pinocchio Interviews - Palette Poetry "And that magic's smell—vernix and blood / and sweat and earth—I didn't register it / as life. I sensed it and saw my decay."

Bringing this back to the timeline while I'm working on .... some new nose-growing questions and answers this morning/afternoon!

www.palettepoetry.com/2025/12/22/e...

Two new poems up today in @aprosexia.org: "Burning Brain" and "Sad/House/Keeping," a pair of vertical rhyming structures about mental illness & wellness.

My thanks to editor RL for spearheading an interesting new project & for including my work.

www.aprosexia.org/case-2-fall-...

We’re 30 days into our reading period and already Shō No. 9 is shaping up to be a great one.

Send bangers!

THE END OF THE LINE ✦ Todd Dillard In this workshop, we will decouple the idea of a line break from historical influence and intuition, and explore a variety of craft strategies to use when considering how to break a line.

Hi friends! I am hosting a poetry workshop focused on line breaks via ONLY POEMS in TEN DAYS! Check it out! shop.onlypoems.com/products/end...

After a Few Beers, My Uncle Asks Me How for Uncle Tommy do you write a poem? It's like laying bricks, I say. You put down one word, then another, and after a while you've made this path. Bullshit, my uncle says. Tell me the truth. The trick, I say, is the bricks can be anything. A window, the moon, even snow. Snow, my uncle says. I remember when I was stationed in Germany in the 80’s. There was this huge field outside the base. It was the kind of cold that yanks your balls up into your stomach, so much snow you'd smoke a little hash and forget the planet you were on was earth. I was on guard duty. Some civilian on a snowmobile raced out of the woods and rocketed across the field, waves of powder foaming up around him. I remember I shouted: Hey Man! Hey man you're trespassing! But he didn't hear. I didn't hear the gun fire, but when he fell off I knew why. And the snowmobile growling like some animal. I ask my uncle, If you could catch the bullet, if you could turn the bullet into anything else, what would you pick? My uncle takes a long drink. Shit man, he says. Maybe a bird? And it appears: a little white bird in his hands, its wingtips freckled with red. What do you feed the bird? I ask, and, like a piece of bread, my uncle tears a corner off the field. The bird pecks it from his palms. How did we get here? my uncle asks, but there's so much snow, we can’t see the path. Before us, a dark wood. You hear that? my uncle asks. And I do. Something's in there. Something ancient, growling.

Second page of the poem in the journal; the entire poem is in the previous image and here: After a Few Beers, My Uncle Asks Me How for Uncle Tommy do you write a poem? It's like laying bricks, I say. You put down one word, then another, and after a while you've made this path. Bullshit, my uncle says. Tell me the truth. The trick, I say, is the bricks can be anything. A window, the moon, even snow. Snow, my uncle says. I remember when I was stationed in Germany in the 80’s. There was this huge field outside the base. It was the kind of cold that yanks your balls up into your stomach, so much snow you'd smoke a little hash and forget the planet you were on was earth. I was on guard duty. Some civilian on a snowmobile raced out of the woods and rocketed across the field, waves of powder foaming up around him. I remember I shouted: Hey Man! Hey man you're trespassing! But he didn't hear. I didn't hear the gun fire, but when he fell off I knew why. And the snowmobile growling like some animal. I ask my uncle, If you could catch the bullet, if you could turn the bullet into anything else, what would you pick? My uncle takes a long drink. Shit man, he says. Maybe a bird? And it appears: a little white bird in his hands, its wingtips freckled with red. What do you feed the bird? I ask, and, like a piece of bread, my uncle tears a corner off the field. The bird pecks it from his palms. How did we get here? my uncle asks, but there's so much snow, we can’t see the path. Before us, a dark wood. You hear that? my uncle asks. And I do. Something's in there. Something ancient, growling.

Cover of the 2026 Winter Edition of The Southern Review featuring a blue-black background with a woman’s long white hair

Really, really happy to have a new poem in one of the first literary journals I ever read as a teen trying to find poems in the world. Here’s “After A Few Beers, My Uncle Asks Me How” in The Southern Review.

Weekend Book Giveaway! Your chance to win a FREE signed, pre‑release copy of MORE FLOWERS! Winner announced Monday! Book mailed Tuesday! Coming soon with Trio House Press

🌸Weekend BOOK Giveaway!🌸

Quote post with one of your most cherished poems, whether your own or someone else’s - bonus points if it includes flowers - and you’ll be entered to win a FREE signed, pre‑release copy of MORE FLOWERS, out February 1st with @triohousepress.org!

Winner announced Monday!

I love how "like a gong" feels like a mallet being swung in the air to strike the gong and the shimmery sound of it afterwards

I also love this last line and how it plays so well juxtaposing "everything," without which it loses a lot of meaning IMO

1429: Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart Today’s poem is Midlife Crisis by Jane Zwart.

To have @maggiesmithpoet.bsky.social feature my poem on @slowdownshow.org would be a dream come true had I ever thought to dream such a wild thing.
Thank you to all the folks who make this podcast, which has introduced me to many, many poets I admire.

www.slowdownshow.org/episode/2026...

Thank you to all the readers and editors at the journals who published my work in 2025. It was, at age 50, my most successful year ever, with 7 new stories out. I’m so grateful to be part of the micro and flash community.

The Ways We Orbit Visit the post for more.

Read "Escape to a Burning Moon" from the 3 part micro series "The Ways We Orbit" here: variantlit.com/the-ways-we-...

We are so proud that "Escape to a Burning Moon" by @kyleisamu.bsky.social from Variant issue 20 is included here! Congratulations all!

What an absolute honor, thank you @variantlit.bsky.social and @bestmicrofiction.bsky.social for including me in this spectacular lineup!

I'm listening to the audiobook, which is excellent. ❤️📖📚

OKD is open again for free subs until we reach our cap! Learn more about us and submit your best poetry or flash fiction: buff.ly/chQ4jpz

Okay Donkey is always open for tip jar ($2.50) or expedited ($4.00) subs! Your contribution helps us pay our contributors and cover other mag-related expenses.

Recommended Reading 2025 Ten(ish) Small Press Titles I Enjoyed This Year Before we exit the madness that was 2025, here is an extremely subjective, non-exhaustive list of small press poetry titles that nourished me this ye…

Check out these poets & presses, buy their books, support them!
@summ.bsky.social @gameoverbooks.bsky.social @majda.bsky.social @toddedillard.bsky.social @variantlit.bsky.social @hanvanderhart.bsky.social @ohiounivpress.bsky.social (cont'd)
necessarymess.wordpress.com/2025/12/31/r...