Paying Fee-Free General Literary Poems

The epigraph stamped on The Baffler no. 1, from Arthur Rimbaud’s “Morning of Drunkenness,” introduced it as a punk literary magazine. It was the summer of 1988. The founders, Thomas Frank and Keith White, were recent graduates of the University of Virginia. They named their magazine as a joke on academic fads like undecidability, then in fashion…
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Unknown.
Avg. Response: Slower than average responder. 361.4 days.
Acceptances: Challenging. 5.9% of poetry submissions accepted.

Glossy Planet is a fast-moving, challenge-style lit mag for writers who have something to say—right now. Each call responds to the world in real time, inviting short, sharp, or strange work that meets the moment. We’re interested in impact over polish, urgency over perfection. Think: the literary version of a group chat, if your group chat included a bunch of excellent writers trying to make sense of it all…
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Winner's Prize: Professional. Details: USD $1,000 for first prize.
Avg. Response: Faster than average responder. 16.9 days.
Acceptances: Challenging. 0.8% of poetry submissions accepted.

Founded online in 2004, Guernica is an award-winning 501(c)3 non-profit magazine focused on the intersection of arts and politics. A home for incisive ideas and necessary questions, we publish memoir, reporting, interviews, commentary, poetry, fiction, and multimedia journalism exploring identity, conflict, culture, justice, science, and beyond…
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Unknown.
Avg. Response: Slower than average responder. 138.2 days.
Acceptances: Challenging. 4.7% of poetry submissions accepted.

A magazine of poised prose, precarious poetry, and photography to pilot our own realms again.
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Semi-pro. Details: USD $5.
Avg. Response: Faster than average responder. 3.2 days.
Acceptances: Challenging. 6.8% of poetry submissions accepted.

Josephine Quarterly was founded in 2012 by poets Komal Patel Mathew and Jenny Sadre-Orafai in Atlanta. The editors are interested in work from both established and new voices. Our tastes tend to run wild from Mary Ruefle to Aimee Nezhukumatathli and Donika Kelly to Lucille Clifton to Louise Glück. A good poem is a good poem. We know what we want when we see it.
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Semi-pro. Details: USD $30.
Avg. Response: Average responder. 51.9 days.
Acceptances: Challenging. 2.6% of poetry submissions accepted.

This literary magazine is a ship. As a waterfowl, the merganser doesn’t quite belong anywhere; it exists in the water (where it hunts), in the air (where it flies), and on the ground (where it nests), in each place part-time. Radical empathy, hope, the thing with feathers. Art runs on authenticity and accessibility. It's down to Earth. And is also an escape to a world beyond.
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Professional. Details: USD $1.00 per line.
Avg. Response: Slower than average responder. 98.7 days.
Acceptances: Approachable. 13.3% of poetry submissions accepted.

Okay Donkey is a literary magazine that likes to read the odd, the off-kilter, and the just plain weird. We like work that’s funny, that’s sad, and that’s both funny and sad. We especially enjoy the experimental, the surreal, the magical realist, and the genre-bending.
Genres:   Open to all/most genres, including: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Semi-pro. Details: USD $25 per poem.
Avg. Response: Faster than average responder. 40.6 days.
Acceptances: Unknown. None reported yet in poetry.

Every month, we hold a free themed contest. The winner is our Poem of the Month, accompanied by both a contributor’s and an editor’s note, as well as a custom piece of artwork created by Derek Mueller.
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Winner's Prize: Semi-pro. Details: USD $40.
Avg. Response: Faster than average responder. 17.9 days.
Acceptances: Unknown. None reported yet in poetry.

For more than 110 years, Poetry magazine has been a monthly gathering space for poets and readers. The magazine publishes contemporary poetry and prose, primarily in English, and translations from contributors all over the world. Poetry has been published in Chicago since its founding in 1912.
Genres: General.
Lengths: Poem.
Payment: Professional. Details: USD $10 per line for text poems, with a min. of $300; $400 for visual poems; $600 for video poems.
Avg. Response: Slower than average responder. 289.6 days.
Acceptances: Challenging. 1.4% of poetry submissions accepted.