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Last Syllable: A Longform Literary Journal @lastsyllablelit.bsky.social · 7d

We are officially open for submissions until October 31st! Send us your long-form fiction, poetry, non-fiction, and your work that transcends the genres! Submit on: lastsyllablelit.com
We can’t wait to read your work!!

#writing #writingcommunity #fiction #poetry #nonfiction #litjournal #submit

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Ell Huang 🖤🤍💜 @nocturnalxlight.bsky.social · 8d

“The beauty was unrelenting. /
I don’t miss it. Look at this chipped mug, / there’s coffee stains inside.”

I’ve been randomly thinking of this poem “After the Fall We Sit in a Dingy Kitchen” by Rita Tiwari on @whaleroadreview.bsky.social again late last night.

www.whaleroadreview.com/tiwari/

After the Fall We Sit in a Dingy Kitchen

Eden was exhausting. Too muchperfection; chance meetingswith God at any moment. Talkingsnakes in the trees, fruit that tastedof more than fruit: like flowers,promises, prayers. Like eatingsunshine.…

www.whaleroadreview.com

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Bex Hainsworth @poetbex.bsky.social · 8d

Delighted to hear that my poem 'Moeritherium' has received a Best of the Net nomination!

Published by the wonderful @whaleroadreview.bsky.social, it was inspired by this model in the Natural History Museum 💙

Moeritherium

After walking beneath blue whale bones
and following the loops of mammoth tusks,

I linger near an unsuspecting model:
the squat, shapely form of a moeritherium.

Indirect ancestor of elephants and sea cows,
all Eocene curves with soft, painted eyes.

The grey egg of her body is dwarfed
by stockier relatives, but she seems

to float in front of me, goddess of buoyancy,
the spirit of the semi-aquatic. I admire her

womb-shaped face, her stubby trunk, which
is touch-whitened from decades of petting,

but resist the urge to reach out. I am content
with our closeness, the shared beauty

of those without descendants.

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Suzy Eynon @suzyeynon.bsky.social · 11d

Thank you @whaleroadreview.bsky.social !! 🩵🩵

Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 11d

And this year's Best of the Net nominees are...
www.whaleroadreview.com/nominations/

Congrats to all, and fingers crossed for you! :)

"Icon/Graph" by Tristan Beiter
"Pregnant at the Taos Gorge" by Julie Ebin
"Glass Animal Collection" by Suzy Eynon
"My High School Teacher Tells Me Men Would Line Up to Get Me Pregnant" by Kindall Fredricks
"Moeritherium" by Bex Hainsworth
"Anxiety said let’s disappear" by Rachel Pittman
"Things my mother has forgotten" by Beth Sherman
"Celestial Navigation" by Christy Tending
"Writing What We Know" by Angela Townsend
"Apples in Bieszczady" by Rachel Walker

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Ell Huang 🖤🤍💜 @nocturnalxlight.bsky.social · 11d

“I recalled enough of the prayer to whisper it to the newts the next day, holding my hands over the plastic dollhouse like some kind of enormous god.” 🦎💛🙏🏼

Such a banger opening to @whaleroadreview.bsky.social’s Fall Issue.

Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts [NEOMFA] @neomfa.bsky.social · 21d

Check out the latest short prose from our Program Director & UA faculty, @marybid.bsky.social, up at @whaleroadreview.bsky.social 🐳

www.whaleroadreview.com/biddinger/

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Ell Huang 🖤🤍💜 @nocturnalxlight.bsky.social · 11d

“This Castle is a Creature,” aka one of my favorite poems we’ve published in @whaleroadreview.bsky.social!

“Will I ever stop being so childish. Sometimes I sharpen / my lead and sometimes I watch as much television as I / want and it’s glorious, shrimp’s eye of color.”

🏰 🌈 🦐 📺

Emma Bolden @emmabolden.bsky.social · 22d

hey friends, i have a poem about how weird it is to have a body in the latest issue of @whaleroadreview.bsky.social and I hope you'll visit the issue here: www.whaleroadreview.com/bolden/

This Castle Is a Creature

I palace the heart centered in my chest. No part
of my body tells the truth. Not a single brutal clot
of wisdom. Not the zero asleep in each bone.

Will I ever stop being so childish. Sometimes I sharpen
my lead and sometimes I watch as much television as I
want and it’s glorious, a shrimp’s eye of color. The subtitles

tell me what to hear, which I appreciate. There’s something
lost in the gray translation of air and anyway I’m just so over.
I’m just about this close to. There’s too much weather

in my body’s center. There’s no shelter to seek in the interior,
blank rooms, bald windows and etceteras, no way to shutter
the bud and the beauty, the dream of what I thought I was

going down smooth. I palace the heart because it can
bring the whole city down along with it, because I’ve never
known a verb more terrible, more gorgeous than to fall.

Emma Bolden is the author of a memoir, The Tiger and the Cage (Soft Skull), and the poetry collections House Is an Enigma, medi(t)ations, and Maleficae. The recipient of an NEA Fellowship, she is an editor of Screen Door Review.

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Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 11d

And this year's Best of the Net nominees are...
www.whaleroadreview.com/nominations/

Congrats to all, and fingers crossed for you! :)

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Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 11d

Congrats to these contributors whose work with relationships, family, or domestic life especially stood out to our staff!

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Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 11d

We have a very belated announcement: while working on this year's award nominations, we discovered that we'd neglected to announce last year's nominees for The Nina Riggs Poetry Award!

www.whaleroadreview.com/nominations/

"My Sister Comes Home After Graduation" by Heather Qin
"Inheritance" by Michael Sun
"Horns" by Jared Beloff
"Dangling Over the Sea" by Nicole Brogdon
"To Be Ten" by Katy Luxem
"Shelved" by Rita Maria Martinez

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Elizabeth Sylvia @esylviapoet.bsky.social · 24d

My review of ODYSSEUS' DAUGHTER by Cammy Thomas has washed up in the perfect journal, @whaleroadreview.bsky.social

Thank you, @katiemanningpoet.bsky.social !

www.whaleroadreview.com/cammy-thomas/

The Subtle Thread

Odysseus’ Daughter by Cammy Thomas Parkman Press, 2023 The first poem of the slim chapbook Odysseus’ Daughter hints at the themes that glance through its poems. In the following pages, delicately d…

www.whaleroadreview.com

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Beth Castrodale @bethcastrodale.bsky.social · 23d

I'm deeply grateful to Whale Road Review for publishing a conversation about occult fiction between me and the insightful novelist Ellen Birkett Morris.

@whaleroadreview.bsky.social @katiemanningpoet.bsky.social @ellenbirkettmorris.bsky.social

Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

Issue 40 features work by @ellenbirkettmorris.bsky.social @bethcastrodale.bsky.social @rita-tiwari.bsky.social @jhhwriter.bsky.social @beekaekae.bsky.social @nfako.bsky.social...

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Jill McCabe Johnson @jillmccabejohnson.bsky.social · 23d

Aww, thanks for reading them, Nate. I love your poem in the latest issue of @whaleroadreview.bsky.social:

www.whaleroadreview.com/fako/

Cleaning Out My Uncle’s Place

On the high shelf, behind the tangle of holiday lights: a box.Mom is packing up the kitchen and this feels sacred,so I click shut the closet door and pull the old bulb’s chain.The apartment smells …

www.whaleroadreview.com

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Beth Kanter @beekaekae.bsky.social · 22d

Delighted to be included in the new issue of @whaleroadreview.bsky.social Thank you @katiemanningpoet.bsky.social for giving “UnNamed” a good home.

Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

Since I live in a place without colorful leaves or colder weather to make it feel like fall, our fall issues are my favorite harbingers of the season. This Fall 2025 issue is full of earnest language and surprising humor, and these pieces are packed with autumn.

www.whaleroadreview.com/issue-40

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Emma Bolden @emmabolden.bsky.social · 22d

hey friends, i have a poem about how weird it is to have a body in the latest issue of @whaleroadreview.bsky.social and I hope you'll visit the issue here: www.whaleroadreview.com/bolden/

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Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts [NEOMFA] @neomfa.bsky.social · 21d

Check out the latest short prose from our Program Director & UA faculty, @marybid.bsky.social, up at @whaleroadreview.bsky.social 🐳

www.whaleroadreview.com/biddinger/

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Mary Biddinger @marybid.bsky.social · 21d

Thanks much for sharing, and gratitude to @whaleroadreview.bsky.social ✨

Northeast Ohio Master of Fine Arts [NEOMFA] @neomfa.bsky.social · 21d

Check out the latest short prose from our Program Director & UA faculty, @marybid.bsky.social, up at @whaleroadreview.bsky.social 🐳

www.whaleroadreview.com/biddinger/

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Grant Clauser @grantclauser.bsky.social · 19d

I want to thank the journals who published poems from my new book: @whaleroadreview.bsky.social @kenyonreview.bsky.social @oneart.bsky.social @jackbedell.bsky.social @laurelreview.bsky.social @nimrodjournal.bsky.social @newversenews.bsky.social @sixthfinch.bsky.social @versedaily.bsky.social ...

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Brian Simoneau @briansimoneau.bsky.social · 11d

Excited & grateful for my poem “Every Poem About This Season Now Becomes a Lie” to appear in this outstanding new issue of @whaleroadreview.bsky.social

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Ell Huang 🖤🤍💜 @nocturnalxlight.bsky.social · 25d

New issue of Whale Road Review just dropped!!! 🍂 🎃

Grab your teas and pumpkin spice lattes and indulge some poems, prose, and pedagogy as a treat!

Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

Since I live in a place without colorful leaves or colder weather to make it feel like fall, our fall issues are my favorite harbingers of the season. This Fall 2025 issue is full of earnest language and surprising humor, and these pieces are packed with autumn.

www.whaleroadreview.com/issue-40

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Jeff Harvey @jhhwriter.bsky.social · 25d

@whaleroadreview.bsky.social @katiemanningpoet.bsky.social thank you for publishing Dad Calls her Gazelle

www.whaleroadreview.com/harvey/

Dad Called Her Gazelle

My aunt had never visited before. She brought Diet Sprite, and we drank it at our picnic table. Dad poured a little Jim Beam into his. Mom wandered near us. I told my aunt how Mom cared for our thr…

www.whaleroadreview.com

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Nate @nfako.bsky.social · 25d

Happy to have a poem in the current WRR :)

Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

Since I live in a place without colorful leaves or colder weather to make it feel like fall, our fall issues are my favorite harbingers of the season. This Fall 2025 issue is full of earnest language and surprising humor, and these pieces are packed with autumn.

www.whaleroadreview.com/issue-40

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Claire Taylor @clairemtaylor.com · 25d

I‘ve wanted to have a poem in Whale Road Review for a long time & now I finally do! Woohoo!!

Thanks @katiemanningpoet.bsky.social!

www.whaleroadreview.com/taylor-5/

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Maud Burnett McInerney @maudmci.bsky.social · 25d

Incredibly proud to be included in this issue!

Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

Since I live in a place without colorful leaves or colder weather to make it feel like fall, our fall issues are my favorite harbingers of the season. This Fall 2025 issue is full of earnest language and surprising humor, and these pieces are packed with autumn.

www.whaleroadreview.com/issue-40

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Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

If you like what you see here, please use one or more of the Tip the Author links below author bios throughout the issue. Thanks for reading!

@katiemanningpoet.bsky.social
Editor-in-Chief

www.whaleroadreview.com/issue-40/

Issue 40

Fall 2025 Poetry & Short Prose Everyone Needs a Bit of Spiritual DevotionMary Biddinger This Castle Is a CreatureEmma Bolden MutationCallie B. Dean Cleaning Out My Uncle’s PlaceNathan Fako Birt…

www.whaleroadreview.com

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Whale Road Review @whaleroadreview.bsky.social · 25d

Issue 40 also features work by @marybid.bsky.social @briansimoneau.bsky.social @maudmci.bsky.social @calliebdean.bsky.social @marjorietesser.bsky.social @emmabolden.bsky.social @esylviapoet.bsky.social @clairemtaylor.bsky.social @brettwarren23.bsky.social and more!

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