Dr. Bitch

West Trade Review Online Exclusives Winter 2025 West Trade Review: Fearless. Crafted. Authentically Human.

We’re excited to present the Winter 2025 collection of Online Exclusives. It features poetry by Nathan Erwin, @ritamookerjee.bsky.social, @ewenglass.bsky.social, and @andhow.bsky.social among others; fiction by Janine A. Willis; CNF by @hillbillypilgrim.bsky.social

Read it here:

Departures 4 In "Wherein the Kardashian Sisters Marvel at their Bounty, Reach Enlightenment," Rita Mookerjee uses the Kardashians' own words to show us a more enlightened side of fame. Write about a celebrity of your choice (reality TV or otherwise) at the moment they reach the afterlife.

Departures 4 is based on the Brewer’s Choice selection for Flight 1, @ritamookerjee.bsky.social piece “Wherein the Kardashian Sisters”

flight-literary.ghost.io/rita-mookerj...

Three abstract panels like a storm erupting against a blue sky. Panel 1: broad, swooping gestures of white and pale gray.

Panel 2: dark veins streak downward like electricity.

Panel 3: a thick, explosive tangle of dark paint with flashes of red.

Cozy up with our DECEMBER ISSUE. 🎁

WORDS by @skyskkyy.bsky.social, Dawid Mobolaji, Grzegorz Bogdał, Derek Maiolo, & Tariq Thompson.
ART by Eric Calloway.
PLUS @allisonwyss.bsky.social interviews @wiswell.bsky.social.

buff.ly/xfJzbi6

Congratulations and best of luck to @ritamookerjee.bsky.social @jackbedell.bsky.social and @mehpoeting.bsky.social

ANMLY. Men by Rita Mookerjee. Men are the sort of people who chisel butter from its block and with a short, blunt knife pummel it back and forth across a bready path until only its stain is left. It never occurs to them to cut off a clean square and heat it for a moment, that butter melts simply asking to be poured.

One of my favorite small poems from ANMLY (@anmlymag.bsky.social) by the illustrious @ritamookerjee.bsky.social for #smallpoemsunday

A dish of partially smashed cherries.

We love ACCOMPLISHMENT SUNDAY as much as we love this poem❤️ Poetry Editor @ritamookerjee.bsky.social published the gorgeous piece, Self-Portrait as the Pie Crust in Heretic (2024), in @upthestaircase.bsky.social: buff.ly/L4U0jlR

“You are Lady Godiva. You are wearing chaps. You made a phenomenon of shaking salads”

Flight 1 comes in for a landing with our Brewer’s Choice category:

@ritamookerjee.bsky.social blew us away with this hybrid piece made up of lines from the Kardashians

Read: flight-literary.ghost.io/flight-1/

Technical-style drawing with an isometric view of industrial buildings on a square plot of land, surrounded by a crevasse on all sides, enmeshed with tree roots. A wonky forest with striped antelopes forms a desolate stronghold around the complex.

Kick back, fix yourself a warm drink, and enjoy our SEPTEMBER ISSUE. 🍁

WORDS by Max Wheeler, JR Fenn, Kimaya Diggs, & Michal ‘MJ’ Jones
ART by Valerie Marshall
AND Benjamin Selesnick reviews Katie Lynn Johnston
PLUS Matthew Groff reviews Gabe Montesanti

buff.ly/uOXuAsg

Blue flyer that says Welcome! Writers in Residence 2025-2026: Allison Blevins, Taylor Byas, Joan Kwon Glass, Rita Mookerjee, Lisa Rhoades, Nina Sudhakar, Lesley Wheeler, Sunni Wilkinson. Logos at the bottom say SWWIM, The Betsy Hotel, Matwaala, and CreArte.

Flyer that says Save Every Date 2025-2026 Reading Season: Thursday, 9/11/25, at 7:00 PM: SWWIM x Matwaala: Nina Sudhakar & Carolene Kurien Thursday, 10/16/25, at 7:00 PM: Lisa Rhoades & Yael Valencia Aldana Thursday, 11/13/25, at 7:00 PM: Taylor Byas & Rosa Sophia Godshall Thursday, 12/11/25, at 7:00 PM: Lesley Wheeler & Haya Pomrenze Thursday, 1/8/26, at 7:00 PM: Rita Mookerjee & Madison Whatley Thursday, 2/12/26, at 7:00 PM: Allison Blevins with Carolina Hospital, Nicole Hospital-Medina, & Holly Iglesias Thursday, 3/19/26, at 7:00 PM: Sunni Brown Wilkinson & Elizabeth Jacobson Thursday, 4/16/26, at 7:00 PM: Joan Kwon Glass & Clayre Benzadón Logos at the bottom read: SWWIM, The Betsy Hotel, Matwaala, and CreArte

Please join us in welcoming our 2025-2026 Writers in Residence. Save every date for our upcoming reading season!

@taylorbyas.bsky.social @ritamookerjee.bsky.social, @joankwonglass.bsky.social @ninasudhakar.bsky.social @lesleymwheeler.bsky.social

#SWWIMEveryDay #SWWIMWithUs #WomenWriters

The cover of the Rita Mookerjee book False Offering

Coconut Oil As a teen, I wish I knew I had perfect skin and spent less time shaving my thighs and the small of my back, rubbing brown sugar and extra virgin into my feet and arms while my mom shouted at me to stop wasting water. I didn't want to peel the brown away, but I hoped for something more dazzling underneath, maybe gold or amber? I lived a life far from beaches so coconuts were rarely on my mind, but once I anointed myself with clear paste, boys would sit by me at lunch, a girl at ballet would tell me I smelled good, and so my oilwork became routine. My vanity grew loaded with oils. All of them impart a different slick: some to lure people in with a dark sheen, some to melt yesterday's kohl from my lid, some to prime me for escape. At night, I'd stroke my shins and knead the petals of my arches. After months in sun on hot grass and driveways, I saw myself reflected in storefronts and car windows and decided I would become a bronze idol, a gilded thistle, a living ember searing through my hair and clothes. Because of my oilwork I keep jars all around the house— in the bathroom, the kitchen, at my bedside- so I always remember how I coaxed myself from the shower and out into the day.

Day 13 of the #sealeychallenge

August 13th- False Offering, Rita Mookerjee

This collection by Flight 1 contributor @ritamookerjee.bsky.social shimmers with inventive, playful language. Read these poems out loud, you won’t regret it

@jacklegpress.bsky.social

For our elusive “Brewer’s Choice” category, we knew instantly there was only one real choice.

@ritamookerjee.bsky.social is a multi-hyphenate, literary powerhouse. She does standup, she does burlesque, she Emcees, she writes poetry, she teaches, we’re not sure there’s anything she DOESN’T do.

rita and bronwen against the world 😂

if it’s not flavor of love rock of
love etc. I don’t want it tbqh

is anyone else categorically adverse to shows about love and dating? 👀

we can all see what you’re doing. you’re just another misogynistic racist too consumed by his own fragility to perform any critical thinking or self-reflection. feel better soon 💕

see also: ya mom

muscle butts are so funny…all that mass and no jiggle to it. what we supposed to do with that???

are you attempting to belittle one of the most transnationally praised political writers of the past decade? embarrassing

I agreed with tucker AND piers morgan this week wtaf

the beyoncé/buffalo soldier 📀🐎is making me so depressed. so much misinformation and glorification of settler colonialism…

precious gems

I read a book about gay people and became gay and then I read a book about straight people and became straight again and then I read a book about Australians and became Australian and then I read a book about Bigfoot and became Bigfoot.

Book-banners are weak knuckleheads.

SPLIT LIP FAM is truly unstoppable!!! Congrats for all this GREAT news @lorisambolbrody.bsky.social @mariannelchan.bsky.social @sashabrown.bsky.social @amorak.bsky.social @livesinpages.bsky.social @amystuber.com @ritamookerjee.bsky.social @ambersparks.bsky.social @maxpasakorn.bsky.social & MORE!

Ice cream truck funerals apparently produce the most horror movie ass sound you can hear in real life

Black ink smudged on white canvas.

Have a goodnight with some poetry on this ACCOMPLISHMENT SUNDAY 🌙 Poetry Co-Editor @ritamookerjee.bsky.social has two iconic poems in @villaineralit.bsky.social‬ we know you'll love: buff.ly/98kePPd

NEW YORK (AP) — Judge says he will order Columbia University protester Mahmoud Khalil released from immigration detention.

Volcano People by Richard Mirabella Our sister went to help the people who came out of the volcano. She told us she was going to leave at the 4th of July picnic, while we sat around eating corn, our hands fatty with butter, silk in our ...

"Our sister went to help the people who came out of the volcano."

When I "came back" to the lit world, it was a @rpmirabella.bsky.social essay that allowed me to reframe how I think about relationship with writing, so it's an HONOR that we get to feature him on @hexliterary.bsky.social this week.

glad that everyone is seeing him clearly now. (this man tried to send his followers on me when I clocked him for being an exclusionary fatphobic twat)