The last eight months have been quite the rollercoaster. I’m now almost seven months into my first year teaching ninth grade (and teaching high school in general), we had a school shooting just miles away from where I was teaching (thankfully no fatalities), I caught a pretty nasty case of COVID that had me fully out of commission for a week and has had lasting effects of fatigue and a bit of that dreaded mind fog, and because I’d been so preoccupied with the whole, actually teaching thing, I’d delayed working on my 300+ hours of virtual classroom work required for my certification and am only now getting close to finishing up (just in time). But enough about me. the issue that shaped up during this time is really awesome and I’m excited to share it with the world.
This issue is truly great and has a tremendous variety. We have more long prose than ever (over 3k words, with a few even over 5k) which includes a mix of non-fiction and fiction, as well as a novel excerpt, and a really strong selection of poetry. We’ve got hardcore bands on tour, doctors in Rwanda, the world ending, the dreamworld, the surreal, the political, the nature of names, the natural tendency to run away, the quantum and the biological. There’s a sonnet, an essay with citations, an image poem—as always, this a whole wonderful collage of writing of all varietals.
Because of the craziness of life right now, we’ve also had a more difficult time getting through our massive backlog of 2021 submissions than we’d anticipated. We try to provide thoughtful feedback on pretty much every submission unless specifically told it’s not wanted, and that takes a whole lot longer than just making an up or down decision. So, we’ve delayed our 2022 reading period until the middle of March (instead of January), and our second annual set of contests, the FuPo Poetry Contest and Ceiling 250 (yes, a 250 word limit instead of 200 word) will be open in April. I’ll also be doing an online poetry workshop which is generative and will target a different literary magazine each meeting. We will do a 4-week version in May, and a 6-week version in July. Here’s the calendar breakdown.
March 15-31 we will be open for No Fee, Tip-Jar and Feature submissions. Feature and Tip-Jar submissions will continue through April 30th in an effort to generate enough money to pay our authors for the rest of 2022. None of our staff (including myself of course) receive a dime in payment for this journal, and things like Submittable, hosting and CLMP membership are cost-factors above paying our authors. We will have a few additional short no-fee submission periods throughout the year in an effort to reach as many writers as possible, knowing that those submission fees can be a barrier-to-entry for many writers that don’t have the means to submit to journals that require fees. Two additional planned windows are June 1-7, and September 1-7, but we may include a couple more depending on the workflow. We’re still figuring out how to maintain the vision of the journal and still exist in the time-space plane that we live in without Harry Potter-esque time-turners. We’re a small staff doing this out of our love of writing, and we want to continue without burning out or slackening our standards. The FuPo Poetry Contest and The Ceiling 250 Contest reading window will be April 1-30. There will be a short additional window extending into May for paid submissions. Also we’re shifting the prize scheduling around so the first prize pieces each receive $500.
NON-CONTEST SUBMISSION WINDOWS:
March 15-31 No Fee submissions
March 15-April 30 Tip-Jar submissions
March 15-April 30 Feature submissions (5-8 poems, 3-5 prose pieces with a 10k word limit, or 1 7-10k word prose piece—$100 payment)
June 1-7 No Fee and Tip-Jar submissions
June 20 Birthday Micro-Window Tip-Jar submissions mini-fundraiser
September 1-7 No Fee and Tip-Jar submissions
CONTEST SUBMISSION WINDOW:
(The FuPo Poetry Contest for funny and poignant poems, and The Ceiling 250 Contest for prose under 250 words) First prize $500 for each contest, all submissions are considered for publication at the regular rate of $30
April 1-30 No Fee submissions (1-2 pieces) only one No Fee submission permitted per author per contest
April 1-30 $7 submissions (1-4 pieces)
May 1-10 $10 submissions (1-4 pieces)
ONLINE GENERATIVE POETRY WORKSHOP:
to reserve a spot or to receive more information about the classes email coastalshelfmagazine@gmail.com
All money generated will go towards paying Coastal Shelf authors, and each week in addition to doing generative exercises and prompts we will take a deep-dive on a different literary magazine. There will also be a private discord server for further discussion, and an optional 1-hour 1-on-1 session following the completion of the class to discuss anything you’d like, whether it’s lit mags, pieces generated in the class, submission strategies etc for a small additional fee. Classes are planned for 7pm CST on Sunday—though this is subject to change.
Class #1: 4 weeks (May 1, 8, 15, 22), 90-minute meetings, $125. We are capping attendance at 8 participants so that we can ensure good interaction and value for the writers choosing to participate. By the end of the 4 weeks you will have a better understanding of 4 journals, you will have at least 6 new poems, and you will receive a portfolio review of 3 pieces which includes suggestions as well as recommendations on journals to check out and possibly submit (based on that portfolio).
Class #2: (July 3, 10, 17, 24, 31, August 7) 6 weeks, 90-minute meetings, $150. We are capping attendance at 8 participants again to ensure good interaction and value. By the end of the 6 weeks you will have a better understanding of 5 journals, you will have at least 8 new poems, and you will receive a portfolio review of 4 pieces which includes suggestions as well as recommendations on journals to check out and possibly submit (based on that portfolio). The final class will be a traditional peer-review workshop.