How's by you, Larry? I've been locked down here in the Valley of the Sun for sooooo long, it's hard not to envy Gill for her week on the beach. At least it is until the old and little used brain recalls just some of the trials not to mention tribulations she's had in the recent past. You go, Gill.

Thanks to Larry for the coffee and to Sarah for the cookies. There are a lot of things I can bitch about these days but those two items ain't on the list. ;)

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Great news from our Survivor. Of course his reward is to dancing with Ms Elizabeth while I try to train Vic to be my seeing eye guide dog. :)

Congrats to Larry and keep on keeping on.

Now about cookies, while it is a goodness to have both cookie jars filled with goodies, who, I ask, who has swiped all the crumbs? ;) Thanks, Sarah. That coffee joint does sound interesting. Of course this coffee place serves a coffee that is beyond compare with anything short of C-ration instant Nescafe' coffee-like fluid. .

Think I'll grab some of those cookies and sip on that old-fashioned coffee while trying to dodge PTSD and sit outside to watch the scorpions fight.

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These are 31 outlets for poetry and they are open for submissions now. Many also accept other genres, like fiction and nonfiction, and about half of the outlets listed here pay writers. A few are currently accepting themed submissions. Here they are, in no particular order. Some deadlines are approaching quickly.

The Puritan
This Canadian literary magazine publishes poetry (send up to 4 poems), fiction, and nonfiction from all over the world. They read year-round, and will read until 25 June 2020 for their Summer issue. Pay is in Canadian dollars – $25 per poem (or page, capped at $80), and more for other genres. Details here.

Alegrarse
They want poetry, nonfiction essays, and close-readings. Send up to 5 poems, or up to 10 pages of poetry. They prefer exceptionally emotional poetry, with exciting language, fun or shocking enjambments; poetry that is heavily imagery-based, that is strange fantastical, and awe-inspiring. They love political poems, love poems, angry poems, profound poems, poems that startle, poems that bend, that distort the tangible, and especially wildly experimental poems. They pay $10 per poem. Details here.

The Dark Sire
This is an online literary journal for poetry (send up to 2 poems), short fiction, and art. They want work by authors and artists who delve into the mystery, psychosis, suspense, and looming darkness of the fantasy, gothic, horror, and psychological realms. Suitable subject matter may include, but is not limited to, vampires, monsters, old castles, dragons, magic, mental illness, hell, disease, or decay of society. They accept multiple submissions. Details here.

Fiyah Magazine: Joy
This speculative fiction and poetry magazine only reads work from Black writers of the African Diaspora. They also read reviews. Also, citing the traumatic circumstances of the moment, and the difficulty through which Black writers are currently writing, donors have contributed funds for the October 2020 Joy issue (see this Twitter update), and rates have now increased for this issue. Pay is $100 for poetry, and up to $1,200 for fiction for this issue. Details here.

Ashville Poetry Review
This is an annual literary journal publishes 180-220 pages of poems, interviews, translations, essays, historical perspectives and book reviews. Send 3-6 poems, of any length or style. The deadline is 15 July 2020. Details here.


The New Verse
They publish politically progressive poetry on current events and topical issues. Details here.


Impossible Archetype
They want poetry by LGBTQ+ folk. All styles and forms are welcome. Send up to 4 poems; submissions should be under 10 pages. The deadline is 1 August 2020. Details here.


Meetinghouse
This is a new literary journal by Dartmouth College, and they are reading poetry (send up to 3 poems) and prose for their inaugural issue. They also accept translations. The deadline is 1 July 2020, and they pay $100 for poems, according to this tweet. Details here.


Writer Shed Press: Love and Sacrifice
This journal is open for its second issue, and the theme is Love and Sacrifice. Apart from poetry, they also accept fiction and nonfiction; submissions must be no more than 2,500 words. Contributors are paid $20 (see guidelines). The deadline is 1 July 2020. Details here.

The Fairy Tale Review: The Gold Issue
They accept work on various fairy-tale related themes. For their Gold Issue the guidelines say, “Anne Sexton published six volumes of poetry between 1960 and 1974, including the vanguard fairy tale collection Transformations (1971) in whose 50th Anniversary year The Gold Issue of Fairy Tale Review will appear. Anne Sexton’s magic takes many guises through fairy tales, feminism, and domestic sorcery. In celebration of Anne Sexton, The Gold Issue will feature poetry, fiction, and nonfiction about and inspired by Transformations.” They are accepting poetry (send up to 5 poems, totalling up to 10 pages), prose, graphic novels, comics, drama, and translations on the theme, and the deadline is 30 June 2020. Translations of fiction, nonfiction, and poetry are open year-round. Details here.

Vastarien
This journal is a source of critical study and creative response to the corpus of Thomas Ligotti as well as associated authors and ideas. They want literary horror poetry (up to 50 lines), fiction, and articles pertaining to these themes. Pay is $50/poem, and the deadline is 30 June 2020. Details here.

Magma Poetry: Dwelling
This UK-based magazine is accepting poetry (send up to 4 poems) on the theme of Dwelling, now through 31 July 2020. See their extensive guidelines for details on the theme. They also accept reviews. Details here.


Poetry Pea
This magazine is currently looking for haiku and senryu, and they also have a podcast. Send up to 10 pieces. Details here.



Elephants Never
They want poetry (up to 3 poems) in any style, including light verse, experimental, traditional verse, or prose poems. They also accept flash fiction, art, creative nonfiction, and hybrid or other work. They take submissions until the 24th of each month for publication the following month. Submissions need not include or feature a pachyderm. They love pieces that engage in wordplay and will always enjoy references to or variations on the phrase, “Elephants never forget.” They sometimes have themed calls. Details here.


Horozons: Ecology; Faith & Politics; Privilege & Power
This is a Christian magazine. It is published by Presbyterian Women, Inc. for the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). They seek poems, stories, and articles on specific themes. For July/August, the theme is Ecology; for September/October, it is Faith & Politics; and for November/December 2020, it is Privilege & Power. They pay. Details here (download submission guidelines), and here (scroll down for themes).


Surreal Poetics: The Penetrating Gaze
This magazine is for the surrealist and founded on the tenets of Surrealism. For their fourth issue they are reading poems on ‘The Penetrating Gaze’. Their guidelines say, “We are interested in how and what the eye reveals to those who are endowed with supersensible vision—to see what is within and without, to see through and beyond—to see and experience, with all of the senses, that which is hidden from common perception.” Details here.

Montana Mouthful: Quarantine
They expect many variations and perspectives on the ‘Quarantine’ theme. They want up to 1,000 words of poetry (up to 3 poems), and they also publish fiction, nonfiction, and artwork. The deadline for this theme is 7 September 2020. Details here.

U.S. Kids – Humpty Dumpty
This is a magazine for children 2-6 years old. They accept poetry of 4-12 lines, and pay $25 and up for these. They also accept fiction, mini-fiction, and craft. Also see Jack and Jill, their magazine for older children. Details here.

Spoonfeed
This is a new magazine and their first issue will be out in September 2020. They want creative food writing in all its forms: poetry (up to 4 poems), short or flash fiction, creative nonfiction, creative reviews, as well as hybrid and experimental writing. The deadline is 30 June 2020. Details here.


Cough Syrup Magazine
For poetry, they are looking for free-verse, haiku, non-traditional, traditional, ecstatic/inspired writing (not religious though), experimental, long or short; send up to 5 pieces. They love work that is Weird, Mind-Bending, genre-bending, surrealism, experimentalism, literary, gonzo, beat. They also publish fiction, nonfiction, and art. Details here.

The Threepenny Review
This respected quarterly journal accepts poetry (up to 100 lines), fiction, nonfiction, and submissions for their ‘Table Talk’ column.
Pay is $200 per poem, and the deadline is 30 June 2020. Details here.

Mizmor Poetry Anthology: Spirituality
Mizmor is an annual anthology of poetry that expresses spiritual experiences with a strong emphasis on the relationship between the modern world and ancient wisdom. They favor true experiences with striking imagery, but do not accept devotional-religious poetry. This anthology is open to all writers of any background and/or affiliation. The deadline is 15 August 2020. The anthology is from Poetica Publishing Company and they also run the Poetica Magazine, which publishes poetry and prose on the Jewish experience. Details here.

Volney Road Review
They are open now for poetry (up to 3 poems, no more than 3 pages per poem), fiction, and nonfiction. They pay $10 per accepted piece. The deadline is 1 August 2020. Details here.


The Willowherb Review
The Willowherb Review aims to provide a digital platform to celebrate and bolster nature writing by writers of color, including Black, Asian, and minority ethnic (BAME) writers, and Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC) anywhere in the world. They are reading now for their third issue. They will accept non-fiction especially, but will consider fiction and poetry (send up to 3 poems) as well. Above all, submissions should have a great sense of place and attention to the natural world. The deadline is 30 June 2020; they pay €50 for poetry. Details here.

The Elephant Ladder: Pride
They are reading work for the Summer issue and the theme is ‘Pride’; they accept work from both LGBTQ+ creatives and allies. Send poetry (any form or length), fiction, or creative nonfiction. Pay is $10, and the deadline is 1 July 2020. Details here.

Red Rover Magazine
This is a mental health focused literary magazine and they are reading work for their fist issue. Their guidelines say, “Just because we are a mental health focused magazine doesn’t mean we only accept artwork that focuses upon well-being as a product. We’re more interested in artwork that inspired well-being as a process. We ask you to submit the artwork that made you feel proud, satisfied, joyous, happy, or invoked any other state of well-being in you”. They accept poems (up to 6 pieces), fiction, and artwork. The deadline is 31 October 2020. Details here.

Hubub

They ask contributors to send them 3-6 typed poems in the mail for their annual issue. Poems selected for publishing get a small honorarium. They also have prizes chosen by external judges from entries for a previous issue: the Vern Rutsala Award of $1.000; the Vi Gale Award of $500; the Kenneth O. Hanson Award of $200; and the Stout Award of $175. Details here.


Fourteen Poems
This is a UK-based magazine and they accept work from Queer poets anywhere. They specially invite Black and other queer POC writers to submit. Send up to 5 poems. Pay is £25 per poem accepted. Details here.

Three Line Poetry
They consider all forms of three-line poems, and accept work from both established and new poets. Submit up to 3 poems. They offer token payment. Details here.

Quaranzine
This is a new online magazine from Third Estate Art (which is formed by a group of artists and activists in Chicago). They are interested in any kind of art with an underlying social justice theme, or any kind of activist work that the author would like an eclectic audience for. They accept poems, stories, essays, videos of performances, visual art, artist talks, instructional videos, comics, and anything else that they can reasonably put into this format. Payment is $20. Details here.

Palette Poetry
Submissions for their Featured Poetry category are open year round to poets at any stage of their career. Featured Poems are published online only and will spotlight a number of poems from new authors each month. They highly encourage emerging authors to submit. Send up to 5 poems (and the total submission should be no more than 10 pages). Pay is $50 per poem, up to $150. Details here.

x x x

taken from the Authors Publish free online newsletter (highly recommended)

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So how you all are? Things seem to be a tad slow in the world of Stories Space. I've been of no help recently so don't mean to come off sounding like some self-righteous busy-body. If you wanna know, I'm more the don't give a flying buffalo chip ne'er-do-well type.) Just telling it like I think it might actually be.

Think I'll crank up the coffee pot and tea kettle, then grab a few of Sarah's cookies, and sit outside to watch the Gila Monsters basking in the sun.

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It's Tuesday. Do you know where your Monday went? ;)

The coffee pot has been rinsed, rubbed and then refilled with the finest water to come out of the tap in some time. At the moment it is converting a big load of dark roast coffee grounds into (what else?) dark roast coffee.

Once it's finished with that voo-do that it do so well, I'll get me a mug full of the stuff, grab a handful of Sarah' cookies and, now that the days are getting shorter, go outside and wait for the first 'blue norther' of winter.

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Greetings to all who enter seeking Inspiration and find only perspiration. Sorry about that.

But in the 'seek and ye may find' category there is a pot full of fresh coffee, and a kettle just loaded with hot water for the tea sippers among us. Most of all, there's the contents of two cookie jars. Enjoy.

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Morning, Ms C and/or H. You and Larry are, as usual, approximately 100% correct about the changes. After it dawned on me that I needed to log-in and I somehow managed to get it right the first time, I came by here to get the inside scoop on the Inspirations social scene and find out about the renovations to the main site.

After a couple mugs of coffee and cookies, I'm now ready to face whatever fate awaits me. BTW, highs down here in the 'Valley of the Sun will be in triple digits, again. Might have to stop back by this afternoon for some ice coffee or sweet iced tea.

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It's Monday all over the world. Yeah, I just checked and its an hour until Tuesday in Australia. Sorry about all that.

I've gotten the coffee pot doing its thing and there's hot water simmering for the tea-sippers among us. Based on Sarah's assurance, there will be cookies when the cookie jars are opened.

Now with filled mug in one hand and cookies in the other, please pardon me or at least let me out of here on account of my good behavior, so I can sit outside and do whatever it is folks do when sitting outside.

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It's another Monday mourning. Could be worse, I suppose. But dang if I know how. ;)

The 'Inspired' coffee pot has been rinsed out and filled with whatever coffee was in the can under the counter and a generous supply of water. At the moments, it's converting all that into a brew that should be drinkable, with luck.

Let us now contemplate the goodness of Sarah's cookies while filling our mugs to the brim with coffee or tea. Enjoy.

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Good coffee. Even better cookies. Things could be worse, maybe even more worser. Y'all keep up the good work. ;)

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Folks always claimed ‘Buck’ Granderson got his nickname because he still had the first dollar he ever made. It wasn’t true, at least not the part about his name. I had it on very good authority that his parents, two otherwise sober and responsible individuals, named him Buckalew Lavelle Granderson. While few knew about his full name, those who did all agreed it must have been a long and...

Added 24 Feb 2020 | Category Flash Fiction | Votes 13 | Avg Score 5 | Views 325 | 11 Comments

Listening In The Rain I'm a good listener; always have been. Especially here inside the cemetery—just sitting in my truck, listening to the rain, hearing it tell the story, and waiting for Holly. We don’t have nice winter weather around here, just cold and rainy. The only thing it’s good for is hunting, especially for deer. But I don't hunt—not anymore. Winter became my favorite season...

Added 30 Oct 2019 | Category Supernatural | Votes 16 | Avg Score 4.94 | Views 477 | 14 Comments

The Tumultuous Tale of the Tormented Terrier Well, let me tell you, it was like this. Once upon a time, our humble hovel was being run by the daughter-unit’s pet, a small, cute, cuddly and constantly yapping Yorkshire Terrier that answered to the name, Puh-Pet, but only if she happened to be in the mood. She loved nothing better than people-food treats and patroling the backyard. Since it...

Added 15 Aug 2019 | Category Memoirs | Votes 9 | Avg Score 5 | Views 484 | 9 Comments

Newly polished toenails safely propped on the crowded coffee table, Darlene Barnes let out a long plume of cigarette smoke and waited for her friend to come back from the kitchen. Waiting in silence, however, had never been her 'thing'. The thirty-something bottled-blonde looked around at the empty doorway to the kitchen. "You know it's hard for me to believe you're this messed-up....

Added 13 May 2019 | Category Young Adult | Votes 5 | Avg Score 5 | Views 808 | 4 Comments

“You guys are nuts.” The Skeptic was in rare form as the four men studied the petite singer flitting around on the dim stage.   “I mean, sure she’s cute, but in a small-town high school cheerleader sort of way. No way is she this smoking’ hot sex object you guys keep raving about. But…”   The Skeptic stopped as the singer approached the microphone stand. Waited for A bright spotlight...

Added 05 Feb 2019 | Category Micro Fiction | Votes 8 | Avg Score 5 | Views 981 | 7 Comments

For the benefit of any unsuspecting reader, let me state now that this is NOT an article about how one might become a contented courtesan or smiling strumpet. Nope, not even a titillated trollop. Sorry about any confusion, honest. Truth be told, this assault on good taste and English letters is concerned with the fine art of creating attention grabbing hooks in the opening lines of your...

Added 18 Dec 2018 | Category Musings | Votes 10 | Avg Score 5 | Views 502 | 7 Comments

Now and Forever: a love story The dream was back--so were the eyes. They hovered in an angry sky just above the horizon, seeing everything but focusing on nothing. Amy knew those eyes—knew a time when they’d been filled with happiness and a love of life. But that had been before her brother came back from Vietnam. Young, naked, and skinny, she stood alone and vulnerable on a hill surrounded...

Added 14 Aug 2018 | Category Romance | Votes 8 | Avg Score 5 | Views 442 | 5 Comments

How’s by you, Grady Lee? Funniest thing happened yesterday. This nice lady from the Veterans Administration stopped by and said what I really needed, I mean with my having gone from hard of seeing to being blinder than any known bat, was one of those so-called smart Apple iPhones. I told her I knew a bit about the thing, how you made gestures to work it, and let her know I'd been...

Added 04 Aug 2018 | Category Flash Fiction | Votes 13 | Avg Score 5 | Views 552 | 11 Comments

On a hot Friday afternoon in the summer of 1970, a young nursing student left work at the VA hospital, and hurried out to the nearby bus stop on First Avenue. The usual stop-and-go Friday traffic appeared to be stuck on stop. From the open windows of a gypsy cab came the sound of an all-news station. “In other national news, a Defense Department spokesman said 18,000 of the 31,000 US...

Added 28 Feb 2018 | Category Flash Fiction | Votes 11 | Avg Score 5 | Views 804 | 9 Comments

   The official plan, as carefully explained to all parental units, had called for Amy and Libby to share a motel room. The guys would stay with Mark’s roommate who was supposed to be in summer school. In reality, Mark’s roommate had just flunked out. And no one questioned that Bob and Libby would have the motel room to themselves. Once they were dropped off, Mark and Amy headed for...

Added 01 Nov 2017 | Category General | Votes 2 | Avg Score 5 | Views 962 | 2 Comments