"That’s what literature does. Puts a word / on your tongue and lets you speak it. / It’s soft power, you fools."
From "Decline of the Humanities," one of two new poems by @rwillsit.bsky.social.
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"I have been sent to this dry and windy town to interrogate the dead."
From "World in the Hole," a new short story by Marguerite Alley.
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“When so much literary fiction seems intent on making an airtight case for a moral view, Vaim’s light touch arrives as a breath of fresh air.”
Jon Fosse and the Perils of Writing Without Intention: Nathaniel Moore reviews Jon Fosse’s Vaim (@transitbooks.bsky.social).
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"Praise the throat, / split like a furnace. / Every word, a coal. / Every prayer, a cough of ash."
From "Rage Psalm," a new poem by Hali Sofala-Jones.
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We are at AWP today through Saturday. Stop by to hear about new initiatives at The Rumpus, our redesign, buy amazing books from my imprint and merch and also we have candy and swag! Booth 1240.
"If sound is a unit of breath, a poem is also a body."
From "The Lesbian Erotic Poem: Eileen Myles and Gertrude Stein," a new essay by Katey Funderburgh.
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"I tend not to know how to say when it hurts. Firstly, / I don’t know what it is. I wait for the call / and no doctor rings."
From "Ostrakon," one of three new poems by Emma Aylor.
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"Surely there was some middle ground between feral and housebroken, continually made to heel."
From "The Pastor's Ex," a new short story by Britt Tisdale.
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"There is no balancing act. There’s no pulling it off. It’s always going to be chaotic..."
@megg-bean.bsky.social interviews @martinespadapoet.bsky.social about Jailbreak of Sparrows (@aaknopf.bsky.social).
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We're gearing up for AWP 2026 in Baltimore!
Find us at BOOTH 1240, and click through to learn more about our Flash Fiction contest and offsite event with @roxanegay.bsky.social, @poetpatriciasmith.bsky.social, @robbiemaakestad.bsky.social, @lydiamwrites.bsky.social & more.
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"Other times, he...simply survived like a snail making its way on a log or a clover among other clovers."
From "Transnational Dreaming in the Port of Hong Kong," a new short story by Brian Ma.
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"Adrift in hollowed out artificial logs, we trailed our fingers in the chlorinated river, then stood, arms wide, daring the darkness to strike us."
From "Knott's Berry Farm, 1996," a new essay by @jenpmeadows.bsky.social.
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"Everything I know about being cruel / I learned from my mother, passed down from her mother."
From "On Drowning," a new poem by Leticia Priebe Rocha.
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"I think the pressure is off with a short story. It’s the purest expression of my ideas, my sense of humor."
@katiecoleman.bsky.social interviews @kimsamek.bsky.social about I am the Ghost Here (@thedialpress.bsky.social).
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"Call me drowning / under the wing of clouds. / Call me back to shore / in waters laced with clocks."
From "Homeless (as a body)," one of two new poems by Jodi Balas.
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"I think the very best poems feel, at once, of the moment and also of all moments. Timely and timeless."
@officialmchangpoet.bsky.social interviews @ds-waldman.bsky.social about ATRIA (@liveright.bsky.social).
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"Track after track, he lays himself bare, bringing different pieces of himself to the surface."
From "Eurotrash as Nonfiction," a new essay by @faith-palermo.bsky.social.
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"I didn’t set out to write a likable character."
Rich Text and the Tunnel Vision of Love: @rachellayown.bsky.social interviews Seán Hewitt about Open, Heaven (@aaknopf.bsky.social).
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"My funeral is unlikely / to be popping / as it stands. My cat / is likely to eat / my face."
From "Ten Reasons Why I Am Afraid to Die," one of two new poems by Erik Moyer.
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"Re-seeing allows us to witness the works we hold dear in full context, flaws and all."
Our next Letter in the Mail (from authors!) comes from @lwwesterfield.bsky.social, author of Woman House (@umasspress.bsky.social).
Subscribe to LITM by Feb. 28 to receive Lauren's letter: buff.ly/WIBeMcg
"...just a few months prior it had been summer, and she lay sticky and pregnant on the laminate floor, her baby cooking inside her like a dragon’s egg over coals."
From "Cold Snap," a new short story by @megjnic.bsky.social.
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"Fingers. Again. Again. / Lucky. / If you killed me, I’d forgive you."
From "Casino," an new poem by Christian Paulisich.
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"For six years, Leeanner was a fixture of the neighborhood. Only when she was dying did she become real."
From "Neighborly," a new original essay by @markbessen.bsky.social.
Read the full piece now at buff.ly/AsNudwv
"In her absence, I remembered how little we shared, how estranged we had become to each other."
From "We Never Needed Each Other," a new original essay by Maggie Lam.
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"I like genres and sub-genres because they impose limits but also facilitate exploration."
Desire is the engine of magic: @egjames.bsky.social interviews @silviamg.bsky.social about The Bewitching (Del Rey).
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"With all your baby-girl hurts saved, squawked; at last forget the trumpet abandoned in its velvet case."
From "Mercury Rule," one of two new original poems by Cate Lycurgus.
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"It was definitely my goal to center multidimensional, complex immigrant characters in the novel."
@annelllopez.bsky.social interviews Ivonne Lamazares about The Tilting House (@catapultbooks.bsky.social).
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"I want to turn away. But more than that, I want to know what happened."
From "Grief Makes Nothing Happen," a new original essay by Liza Katz Duncan.
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"It is a grave skill, loneliness. One either learns to swim with the current or drown."
From "Bird Shoots Buck," a new original short story by Jessika Bouvier (@@jessikavbouvier.bsky.social).
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“...their friendship, though flawed and caked in contemporary culture, defines rebellion.”
Katrina Ray-Saulis reviews @emilynemens.bsky.social's Clutch (@tinhouse.bsky.social).
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