Foglifter is a biannual compendium of the most dynamic, urgent queer and trans writing today. It’s a space where LGBTQ+ writers celebrate, mourn, rage, and embrace.
Foglifter welcomes daring and thoughtful work by queer and trans writers in all forms, and we are especially interested in cross-genre, intersectional, marginal, and transgressive work. We want the pieces that challenged you as a writer, what you poured yourself into and risked the most to make. But we also want your tenderest, gentlest work, what you hold closest to your heart. Whatever you're working on now that's keeping you alive and writing, Foglifter wants to read it.
What does that look like? Check out some writing we love from our recent issues:
- “Seven Dates” by Elliot Gish
- “Whirlpool” by Meg Cass
- “Zulum,” by Fargo Tbakhi
- “INWARD ASPECT,” by Chekwube Danladi
- “Magical Faggot as Cinematic Study,” by Dez Deshaies
Editorial Statement
We provide a path to representation for a broad selection of LGBTQ+ voices, centering queer and trans literary artists of color, youth, elders, and those beyond traditional LGBTQ+ cultural centers so that our readers and audiences can see their own experiences authentically represented through queer and trans literary arts.
We believe that queer and trans people must curate our own artistic discourses and we curate with a commitment to not perpetuate harm in our communities and recognize our responsibilities as editors to uplift the voices of queer and trans people while not punching down on those of us who live at the intersection of multiple oppressed identities.
Writers in Need Fund
Foglifter is excited to launch the Writers In Need fund to support sliding-scale payments for our contributors. While we have been deeply fortunate to be able to compensate contributors for their important and incredible writing with a modest honorarium, Foglifter recognizes the many intersections of our queer and trans artistic communities, and that members of our community may be differently impacted by financial insecurity and historical disenfranchisement. This fund is an attempt to address those inequities. Please see the Submit page on our website for details.
Guidelines
Title your submission with the title of the work(s) you are submitting (separated by commas).
Include a 50-word or less bio (with pronouns after your name, please!) in your cover letter. (If accepted, we will request an author photo; JPG or PNG files are best.)
We accept the following unpublished unsolicited submissions:
- 3 to 5 poems (max 5 pages)
- up to 7500 words of fiction or nonfiction (up to three flash fiction pieces)
- up to 20 pages of cross-genre work, text-image hybrids, or drama
All submissions must be uploaded as one DOC or DOCX file using the following titling convention: First_Last_Foglifter (i.e., Audre_Lorde_Foglifter)
- We accept simultaneous submissions; however, please withdraw your piece immediately if it is accepted elsewhere (or, if you only need to withdraw part of a submission, send us a message in Submittable).
- Only one submission per genre is permitted each reading period.
- We do not accept previously published material.
- We welcome translated work in all genres, provided rights have been secured before submission. (Both author and translator will receive an honorarium.)
- If we've recently accepted your work, please wait two reading periods (1 year) to submit again.
- Contributors receive two copies of the issue in which they appear and a $50 honorarium (via PayPal).
Submission periods are:
- March 1 to May 1 (Fall Edition)
- September 1 to November 1 (Spring Edition)
- We are always open for cover art! Reach our production manager Alice Lee at production@foglifterpress.com. (For all other submissions, please use the applicable form below.)
In response to rapid gentrification and displacement of QTBIPOC+ literary artists in the San Francisco Bay Area, and in celebration of these communities’ revolutionary history, Foglifter Press, RADAR Productions, and Still Here San Francisco joined forces to create a poetry chapbook prize for local emerging queer and trans Black writers, indigenous writers, and writers of color. Each year, one chapbook author is awarded publication, a $1,500 prize, and $1,000 to support their book tour/promotion.
Judges:
- Edward Gunawan, author of 2023 Start A Riot! winning chapbook The Way Back
- Aja Lenae
- Tiara Amar
Eligibility:
- Submitter is a QTBIPOC+ literary artist
- AND is a current resident of the larger San Francisco Bay Area (Alameda, Napa, Santa Clara, Contra Costa, San Francisco, Solano, Marin, San Mateo, Sonoma counties)
- AND does not have a previous full-length poetry book publication
Manuscript Details:
- Poetry (Literally anything that falls under the verse genre—prose poetry, hybrid, etc. We want all your wild experiments!)
- 25 pages max
- Remove all identifying information, including acknowledgments. There should be one title page with the name of the chapbook only.
- Microsoft Word doc preferred; PDF also accepted
Important Dates:
- Submissions: September 1 to November 1, 2023
- Results Announced: Spring 2024
- Chapbook Release: June (Pride Month) 2025
The guest poetry editor for this issue is Saúl Hernández. Saúl (he/him) is a queer writer from San Antonio, TX who was raised by undocumented parents. Saúl has an MFA in Creative Writing from The University of Texas at El Paso. As a finalist for The Wisconsin Poetry Series, Saúl’s first poetry collection, How to Kill a Goat & Other Monsters, is forthcoming in Spring 2024 from University of Wisconsin Press. He’s the winner of both the 2022 Pleiades Prufer Poetry Prize (selected by Joy Priest) and the 2021 Two Sylvias Press Chapbook Prize (selected by Victoria Chang), as well as a finalist for the 2020 Palette Poetry Spotlight Award, among other recognitions. His poems have been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and Best of The Net and are featured in Pleiades, Frontier Poetry, Poet Lore, Foglifter, Quarterly West, Pidgeonholes, The Acentos Review, Cosmonauts Avenue, and more. He currently lives in San Antonio, TX.
Submission must adhere to the following guidelines:
- Submit 3 to 5 poems (max 5 pages).
- Each new poem must start on its own separate page.
- Include all poems in a single Word document (and put the titles of your poems, separated by commas, in the title field).
Foglifter aims to reflect the vibrant diversity of the LGBTQ+ literary community in our award-winning journal. Fill out our anonymized Demographics Survey to be considered for publication—then take a screenshot of the thank-you screen at the end and attach it along with your submission.
The guest fiction editor for this issue is Kayla Upadhyaya. Kayla (she/her) is the managing editor of Autostraddle and the managing editor of TriQuarterly magazine. She is a lesbian writer of fiction, essays, and pop culture criticism based in Orlando, and she is the author of the queer horror novelette Helen House (Burrow Press, 2022).
- Please send a single Word document with up to 7500 words of fiction (up to three flash fiction pieces). Make sure it is in standard double-spaced formatting and a font that we don't need a microscope to read.
Foglifter aims to reflect the vibrant diversity of the LGBTQ+ literary community in our award-winning journal. Fill out our anonymized Demographics Survey to be considered for publication—then take a screenshot of the thank-you screen at the end and attach it along with your submission.
The guest hybrid, drama, and nonfiction editor for this issue is Lindsay Choi. Based in Berkeley, CA, 최 Lindsay is the author of Transverse (Futurepoem, 2021), which was a finalist for the 2022 Lambda Literary Award in Transgender Poetry. They are also the author of the chapbooks Who Can Remember His Past Lives (Belladonna* Chaplet Series, 2022), and Matrices (speCt! Books, 2017). Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in translation in Nioques, 22/23: Nouvelle Poésie des États-Unis (New U.S. Poetry), Edited by DoubleChange Collective and translated to French by Abigail Lang, and Tydningen, translated to Swedish by Sara Wengström. Recent writing can be found in Amerarcana and Aster(ix) Journal. They are a Kundiman fellow and a Ph.D. candidate in English at UC Berkeley, and they run the chapbook press MO(0)ON/IO. Visit them at lindsaychoi.com.
- Please send a single Word document with up to 7500 words of nonfiction (up to three flash nonfiction pieces).
- Make sure it is in standard double-spaced formatting and a font that we don't need a microscope to read.
Foglifter aims to reflect the vibrant diversity of the LGBTQ+ literary community in our award-winning journal. Fill out our anonymized Demographics Survey to be considered for publication—then take a screenshot of the thank-you screen at the end and attach it along with your submission.
The guest nonfiction, hybrid, and drama editor for this issue is Lindsay Choi. Based in Berkeley, CA, 최 Lindsay is the author of Transverse (Futurepoem, 2021), which was a finalist for the 2022 Lambda Literary Award in Transgender Poetry. They are also the author of the chapbooks Who Can Remember His Past Lives (Belladonna* Chaplet Series, 2022), and Matrices (speCt! Books, 2017). Their work has appeared or is forthcoming in translation in Nioques, 22/23: Nouvelle Poésie des États-Unis (New U.S. Poetry), Edited by DoubleChange Collective and translated to French by Abigail Lang, and Tydningen, translated to Swedish by Sara Wengström. Recent writing can be found in Amerarcana and Aster(ix) Journal. They are a Kundiman fellow and a Ph.D. candidate in English at UC Berkeley, and they run the chapbook press MO(0)ON/IO. Visit them at lindsaychoi.com.
- Please send a single Word document with up to 7500 words of nonfiction (up to three flash nonfiction pieces).
- Make sure it is in standard double-spaced formatting and a font that we don't need a microscope to read.
Foglifter aims to reflect the vibrant diversity of the LGBTQ+ literary community in our award-winning journal. Fill out our anonymized Demographics Survey to be considered for publication—then take a screenshot of the thank-you screen at the end and attach it along with your submission.