Literary Journal

Corporeal

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About the magazine

Corporeal is a literary magazine founded on the conviction that writing is an embodied act. Since its inception, the publication has sought to gather work that resists the disembodied tendencies of much contemporary digital culture, favoring instead texts that attend to the senses, the physical world, and the vulnerable materiality of language. Its pages are open to poetry, short fiction, and essays that demonstrate a felt awareness of the body—its pleasures, its limits, its unruly persistence. The magazine operates with a quiet, deliberate pace, releasing issues that feel curated rather than assembled, each one an argument for the necessity of visceral, attentive reading.

Editorial focus

An archive in progress, Corporeal aims to facilitate healthy and safe exploration of embodiment related to disability, age, ethnicity, sexuality, gender, and more. It is open to art in any form it can find a way to host.

PoetryFictionCreative Nonfiction

Submitting your work

Reading periodJan 1 to Dec 31

Reading feeNo

PaymentNo payment

Simultaneous submissionsYes

Unsolicited submissionsYes

Before submitting, read at least one full issue to understand the magazine's somatic orientation. Corporeal favors work that engages the senses concretely rather than abstractly; avoid pieces that treat the body as mere metaphor or political slogan. Send 3–5 poems or a single prose piece under 4,000 words. Simultaneous submissions are acceptable, but notify immediately upon acceptance elsewhere. Expect a response time of two to four months; the editors prioritize careful reading over speed. Include a brief cover letter that states your connection to the magazine's ethos—no lengthy bio. Do not query about status before eight weeks. Above all, trust the work's physicality: if a line cannot be felt in the mouth or the gut, it likely does not belong here.

We will not be home to hate, discrimination, hurtful commentary, or graphic depictions of sexual violence. All submissions must be tagged with applicable content warnings. In particular, the editors ask that you flag sexual violence, child abuse, disordered eating, self harm, suicidal ideation, and any discussion of vomiting. Editors work on crip time, which means we work when we can and extend that same respect to our artists.

Read official guidelines