As Black History Month draws to a close, we’re excited to announce we are opening up our next free submission period specifically to Black writers. Keep the celebrations going by sending your poems, short stories & essays, free until we reach capacity!

Jane Zwart reads her poem, “Night Class,” from our Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Our readers and editors were immediately enamored with Zwart’s work. One reader notes “I find a simple and wonderous beauty to them;” our poetry editor, Lindsay Olson, writes “I was captivated by the quiet sense of longing in this poem, and appreciate the… [Read More]

Eli Jacobs reads from his essay, “Long Hard Day,” from our Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. This work was originally among the finalists for the 2020 Literary Awards, and our nonfiction editor, Cody Gambino, enjoyed it so much he snatched it up for this issue. Our readers commented that this piece really took up an emotional resonance… [Read More]

Justin Noga reads from his short story, “An Egg Begets an Egg,” from our Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Fiction editor, Wendy Wimmer, writes “Justin Noga bottled hot lightning in a Mason jar. The lines that clinched me were ‘He ordered biking attire, but only got the socks, thigh-high. He made do.’ Plus, hard-boiled eggs in unexpected… [Read More]

Doris W. Cheng reads from her short story, “The Choice, 1988” from Witness Magazine’s Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Fiction Editor, Wendy Wimmer, noted that this story “was such an arrow into my heart. A primer in exquisite narrative.” Our readers were quickly captivated by Cheng’s ability to wield the power of the second person point of… [Read More]

Arianne Zwartjes reads from her essay, “Cities of Broken Teeth, Cities of Dust and Blood” from Witness Magazine’s Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Our readers were drawn into this thought-provoking and lyric work in which Zwartjes explores devastation in the wake of human cruelty and violence in times of war. It is an artful composition at a… [Read More]

We love our writers, readers, & subscribers! As a special treat this season, we’re offering $5 off memberships and gift memberships when you use the code “”LITLOVE” at checkout. That’s 2 years of everything we make, and a fancy badge to wear for special occasions! Much love to you!   Click here to shop Membership

Kristina Ten reads an excerpt from her short story, “Two Hundred Ways to Disappear,” from our Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Our readers quickly fell in love with this one, and Fiction Editor, Wendy Wimmer, notes that this story “is one that I kept thinking about for weeks… …The boyfriend, the hole, the language how it twisted… [Read More]

Molly Reid reads from her Pushcart-nominated short story, “Talk with Stranger,” which appears in our Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. This story was selected as a finalist in our second Witness Literary Fiction Awards, and we liked it so much we just had to have it for the issue. Reid’s work is beautifully rendered as she wields… [Read More]

Cleo Qian reads from the short story, “We Were There,” which appears in our Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Qian’s work first caught our readers’ interest with its beautiful attention to detail. “The author has a gift for visceral descriptions, for creating an atmosphere,” one reader noted. Another reader was compelled by the thought-provoking imagery, and even… [Read More]

Adrie Rose reads a selection of work along with her Pushcart-nominated poem, “The Anthropocene” (4:00), which appears in Witness Magazine’s Fall/Winter 2020 Issue. Rose’s poem became a prescient mantra for the work we selected in this season of pre- and full-pandemic lockdown. Where she writes “The seasons / are coming loose,” we caught a glimmer… [Read More]

Witness Weekends are back with a bang! Join us as Christopher Citro reads from his poem, “The New Avenues the Only Avenues We Have,” from the Fall/Winter 2020 Online Issue. Citro’s work was a fast favorite among our readers, who found his poems well-crafted, intimate and surprising. Ultimately we were drawn in to the blue-dark… [Read More]