Editor Interview: Poetry South

Eclectic poems with heart

There are so many, but I want to give a shout-out to some lesser-known little magazines: Delta Poetry Review, Big Muddy, Birmingham Poetry Review, Tar River Poetry, Okay Donkey, and Juke Joint. All are doing great things.

Again, there are so many writers we admire right now. Here are some that we've published and a few we haven't. Claude Wilkinson, John Sibley Williams, Ellen June Wright, Sjohnna McCray, Ashley M. Jones, Jacqueline Trimble, Derrick Harriell, Adam Vines, and Cassondra Windwalker. I'm sure there are many I'm overlooking.

We try to be a regional magazine with an international reach that is open to a wide range of voices and to poets in every stage of their writing lives. Every issue, we include some poets who are publishing their first poem, and we have many established poets who may be publishing with us for the first time. We do not charge a submission fee, and we try to be as egalitarian as possible in our reading practices.

Read the archived free back issues on our website. There's no better way to learn what kind of poetry we're likely to respond well to. Then surprise us. We're not necessarily looking for fireworks in a poem, but we want to see language that stands out, an image that hits home, or a unique perspective. Maybe all of the above.

Four of your best poems. If you care about them and have given them the level of revision that care deserves, then odds are good that they will stand out.

We are an annual magazine with one deadline on July 15. Please submit only once per year. If a single poem in a submission has been accepted elsewhere, then message us in Submittable to let us know, but don't use Submittable's Notes feature — only you see Notes, so send a Message.

We do ask for a short bio with your submission because we will use it in our contributors notes. We do not want to know everything you've ever published, just a fairly standard bio with a representative list of recent accomplishments. Don't try to impress, but do use it as a way to give a shout-out to other journals or to your books. We're happy to know if you haven't published much before, so don't feel bad if that's the case. We usually try to read cover letters after reading your poems so they don't unduly impact our decisions.

We generally read all submissions, often more than once, but if there is a turn-off early in a poem, we may stop reading it before the end. Turn-offs include things like sexist or racist language or imagery.

Most pieces are read multiple times, often by two or more readers, before they are accepted. We also sometimes attempt to typeset the poem if the formatting looks like it might be problematic for our 5.5 x 8.5 inch magazine. If we think we can print such a poem with minor formatting changes, we will include that in our acceptance letter and give the poet the chance to accept or decline. There have been some great poems that we knew we simply couldn't do justice to, so we had to send it back.

I direct the low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Mississippi University for Women, am department chair of Languages, Literature, and Philosophy, direct the Eudora Welty Writers' Symposium, teach at least two classes per semester, and have lots of other things going on besides Poetry South. Sitting down to read for Poetry South is a joy and a relief from all those other activities, but it does not happen every day. Sometimes I even find time to write my own poems and submit them to other magazines. Whenever possible, I find a 2-3 hour window when I can reach a number of submissions, mark the ones I'm most interested as yes or maybe, and return the ones I'm less interested in as soon as possible. I try to review about a month's worth of submissions at a time, and then make final decisions on the ones I've been interested in, often comparing notes with our assistant editors before a final decision is made.

We do limited editing. If we notice a typo, we will confirm with the author before correcting it. If there are many editorial issues, though, we're more likely to decline the submission than to edit it. We receive many more submissions than we can publish, so it is up to the poet to proofread carefully before submitting.

Yes, we nominate for the Pushcart Prize.