Submissions to the 2025 contest issue has now closed! Thank you to all who submitted!
2025 Contest Judges:
Poetry: Corey Van Landingham
Fiction: Halle Hill
Nonfiction: Aaron Burch
Every spring, phoebe hosts contests in poetry, fiction, and nonfiction, each with a $500 prize. The winners of these contests, as well as honorable mentions, will be published in our spring online issue, 54.2. Honorable mentions, as well as visual art selected to appear in the issue, will be paid our standard rate of $30 per accepted piece.
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Submissions for the contest issue are open annually between January 15 and March 15. We also accept submissions of fiction, nonfiction, poetry, and visual art for publication in our print issue between August 15 and October 15.
phoebe purchases First North American serial rights and pays $30 per accepted poem, essay, story, and piece of visual art. All contributors to the print issue also receive one copy of the journal upon publication. The fee for submission is $3 in all genres, including visual art.
The payment of monetary prizes and contributor honorariums are subject to U.S. laws and regulations, including those that prohibit payments to persons from or who reside in countries subject to U.S. sanctions. Questions about these regulations and payment methods can be directed to phoebeliterature@gmail.com.
Phoebe makes every effort to be open to all and closed to no one. We welcome submissions from BIPOC, LGBTQ+ and international writers and artists. For writers and artists for whom the submission fee presents a hardship, fee waivers can be requested by emailing us at phoebeliterature@gmail.com
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phoebe prides itself on supporting up-and-coming writers, whose style, form, voice, and subject matter demonstrate a vigorous appeal to the senses, intellect, and emotions of our readers. We choose our writers because we believe their work succeeds at its goals, whether its goals are to uphold or challenge literary tradition.
We insist on openness, which means we welcome both experimental and conventional prose and poetry, and we insist on being entertained, which means the work must capture and hold our attention, whether it be the potent language of a poem or the narrative mechanics of a short story. Above all, we seek to publish quality writing. Please review website publications, especially our latest online issue, for an idea of the caliber of writing we publish.
Our general guidelines are available here. Please note: At this time, phoebe does not accept work that uses AI generated text or artwork.
phoebe is now accepting submissions for its winter 2026 print issue, 55.1.
The phoebe fiction team is looking for pieces that deliver an honest, affecting, and human reading experience. We encourage experimentation with modality and crave complexity, and we believe that part of what makes a piece excellent is its voice. We eagerly welcome BIPOC, (dis)abled, LGBTQIA+, and immigrant, international, and non-Western perspectives. Please send us your work that has soul and urgency. Pieces published inphoebe are often briskly paced (fewer than 5,000 words), but longer works of exceptional quality can also find a home here. We look forward to reading your writing!
General Guidelines:
- All entries should include a cover letter with the submission’s title and word count as well as the author’s contact information (name, mailing address, and email address) and a brief bio.
- We accept simultaneous submissions. However, if your submission is accepted by another publication or otherwise is no longer available, please use Submittable to withdraw it as soon as possible.
- You may submit multiple entries.
- Please submit only one short story or up to three flash fictions (works of fewer than 1,000 words) per entry.
- We do not consider previously published work or reprints.
- Please submit your work in standard manuscript format and as a Microsoft Word document (or compatible).
- We do not accept submissions through e-mail or physical mail. All submissions must be made through our Submittable forms.
- More submissions guidelines here: www.phoebejournal.com/submissions/
DEADLINE: October 15 at 11:59 p.m.
SUBMISSION SIZE: 1 piece per submission. We do not have a strict word limit for prose; however, fiction longer than 4,000 words will need to be extraordinary.
We strive to respond to submissions 30 days after the submissions period closes. If you have not heard from us 60 days after the submissions period closes, feel free to inquire about the status of your submission.
phoebe is now accepting submissions for its winter 2026 print issue, 55.1.
We appreciate poetry that risks: vulnerability, experimentation, diction, the poet’s soul. Surprise us with your image work, your use of the line, and your approach to form. Send us poems that grip us with their intensity, honesty, and craft. We enjoy the surreal and the unexpected but we also appreciate heartfelt and new approaches to old topics. Whether you’ve never been published before, or you have a lengthy CV, we want to read your work! We also encourage submissions from poets identifying as a member of a previously underrepresented group of people including but not limited to folks who are: BIPOC, LBGTQIA+, and disabled writers.
General Guidelines:
- All submissions should include a cover letter with the author’s contact information (name, mailing address, and email address) and a brief bio.
- PLEASE include the names of your poems under the TITLE box in the submission form
- We accept simultaneous submissions. However, if a piece in your submission is accepted by another publication or otherwise is no longer available, please use Submittable to send the editors a message about which piece(s) is no longer available or withdraw the submission as soon as possible.
- You may submit multiple submissions.
- You may submit up to five poems per entry; however, poetry submissions may total no more than 10 pages. If you would like to submit more than 10 pages, please complete an additional submission.
- We do not consider previously published work or reprints.
- Please submit your work in standard manuscript format and as ONE Microsoft Word document (or compatible). Please do not submit poems in separate documents.
- We do not accept submissions through e-mail or physical mail. All submissions must be made through our Submittable forms.
- More submissions guidelines here: www.phoebejournal.com/submissions/
DEADLINE: October 15 at 11:59 p.m.
SUBMISSION SIZE: Up to five (5) poems submission.
We strive to respond to submissions 30 days after the submissions period closes. If you have not heard from us 60 days after the submissions period closes, feel free to inquire about the status of your submission.
phoebe is now accepting submissions for its winter 2026 print issue, 55.1.
The phoebe nonfiction team is looking for personal, lyric, and journalistic essays (and everything in between!) that embrace complexity and explore unique topics, ideas, and connections. We are excited by nonfiction that reveals larger truths about the self and the world through unique lenses, representing diverse identities and voices with intellectual and emotional honesty. We also appreciate essays engaging with research and history. Teach us something new! Submitted work should be stand-alone. On our pages, we aim for a mixture of brevity and breadth from both emerging and experienced writers. We approach all essays with care and respect, and we especially welcome essays with BIPOC, LGBTQIA+, and/or trans perspectives. :)
General Guidelines:
- All entries should include a cover letter with the submission’s title and word count as well as the author’s contact information (name, mailing address, and email address) and a brief bio.
- We accept simultaneous submissions. However, if your submission is accepted by another publication or otherwise is no longer available, please use Submittable to withdraw it as soon as possible.
- You may submit multiple entries.
- Please submit only one work per entry.
- We do not consider previously published work or reprints.
- Please submit your work in standard manuscript format and as a Microsoft Word document (or compatible).
- We do not accept submissions through e-mail or physical mail. All submissions must be made through our Submittable forms.
- More submissions guidelines here: www.phoebejournal.com/submissions/
DEADLINE: October 15 at 11:59 p.m.
SUBMISSION SIZE: 1 piece per submission. We do not have a strict word limit for prose; however, nonfiction pieces longer than 4,000 words will need to be extraordinary.
We strive to respond to submissions 30 days after the submissions period closes. If you have not heard from us 60 days after the submissions period closes, feel free to inquire about the status of your submission.
Above all, we seek to publish quality art from artists at various stages of their careers, with an eye towards artwork that illustrates a narrative or conveys an emotion, as we believe in the importance of both visual and textual storytelling. See here for images we've featured in our journal.
phoebe is a paying market in all genres, and the fee to submit visual art is $3. All contributors to the print issue will receive payment of $30 per piece accepted, in addition to a copy of the issue upon publication. Pieces chosen for the print issue will also be featured on our website.
To submit, please upload between one and five high-resolution images. Files should be uploaded as a .png, .tif, or a high-quality .jpeg with at least 300 dpi and a size of at least 1 MB. PDFs also are acceptable. All submitted artwork will be considered for phoebe's print issue, 54.1, for both the cover image, as well as for featured art.
phoebe makes every effort to be open to all and closed to no one. We welcome submissions from BIPOC, LGBTQ+ and international artists. For artists for whom the submission fee presents a hardship, fee waivers can be requested by emailing us at phoebeliterature@gmail.com.