Submissions

Status (Individual): 🟢 Open – Share your voice

Status (chapbook): 🔒 Closed – Opening Soon

Submissions are currently closed. These guidelines are shared in advance to help interested poets prepare. In the coming months, we’ll open slowly, intentionally, and with a clear structure in place. These guidelines reflect our current intentions and values and may be refined before submissions officially open.

What We’re Looking For

Raw Mischief Press is a home for the quietly unplaceable—the eclectic, the haunting, the sacredly off-center. We’re interested in poetry that doesn’t always fit elsewhere but still lingers.

We seek work that is emotionally resonant, transformative, and unafraid to ache or echo.

Submission Categories

Individual Poems

• Send 1–3 original and unpublished poems.
• Selected poems may appear on our website and/or in a Substack dispatch.
• We welcome all styles, especially those with depth, tension, and spiritual or emotional resonance.
• From time to time, we may invite selected work to appear in a future Raw Mischief Press anthology. Participation would always be optional and arranged through a separate conversation and agreement.

Chapbooks (Future Call)

• Chapbook submissions may open later in 2025.
• Length: 15–50 pages, double-spaced, one poem per page.
• Poems should not exceed two pages each; one-page poems preferred.
• At least 75% of content must be previously unpublished.

Formatting & Materials

• Submit your poem(s) via the provided form — plain text is welcome.
• If your poem relies on specific formatting, and your work is accepted, we will request a formatted PDF file at that time.
• No DOCX, Google Docs, or other file uploads at this stage, please.
• Author bio (100 words or fewer) and any additional materials will be collected after acceptance.

Submission Policies

• Simultaneous submissions are welcome. Please notify us and withdraw if accepted elsewhere.
• Submission limits for online publication will be capped at 1 per quarter, with no more than 3 poems per submission. Full details will be shared when submissions officially open.
• When chapbook submissions open, poets may submit 1 manuscript per quarter. Submission windows and reading capacity may vary by season.
• No formal reading periods—submissions open and close as needed.
• We aim to respond within 4 weeks of submission.
• Submitted work may be cached indefinitely for future consideration.

Editorial & Rights

• Selected work may receive light editorial feedback, always discussed with the author.
• Publication terms will be confirmed in a brief contributor agreement, which will be provided to accepted authors prior to publication.
• Selected work may also be shared in part on our social media or newsletter platforms, always with full credit to the author and with care.
• Authors retain copyright unless otherwise agreed.
• Published work will include a brief three-month exclusivity window, during which we request that it not appear elsewhere. After this window, all rights fully revert to the author for any future publication.

AI Policy

We only accept human-derived creative work. AI tools may be used for proofreading or feedback, but the core creative process must be your own.

Ready to share your work?

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