West Trade Review

"Fighting the Bull" by Elizabeth Wenger

"Fallow" by Blake HC Mihm

"longing is a name for god" by Alex Baskin

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Poetry

Fiction

Home About Subscribe Guidelines Submit Exclusives West End Roots & Words

Volume 17 Summer 2026 Online Exclusives

We’re excited to present the Summer 2026 collection of Online Exclusives. It features poetry by Adam Falkner, Yasmine Bolden, Liza Rose and Emily Adam-Aucoin among others; fiction by Sofia Rabate and Blake HC Mihm; CNF by Elizabeth Wenger

Cover art by Donna Young (IG: @donnayoungart): "If True Love Were Mine"

Read the collection here.

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Nonfiction

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Stay Connected to Our Literary Community. Subscribe to Our Substack Roots & Words

Trill: Poems That Resonate

A New Poem Each Week

We are looking for poems that perform Olympic feats with language that leave a reader in wonder while still referring back to the basic things that make us human. We want powerful imagery and enjoy the juxtaposition of images in interesting and unexpected ways Look for a new theme each month and a new poem published on our website each week.

Click here for details and the list of upcoming themes.

July's theme: unraveling; August's theme: Turning Points

Roots and Words: Essays on the Creative Life

We are looking for nonfiction essays that explore creative life expansively conceived (broader than only literary).

We are seeking personal essays exploring creative practice, reading practice, engagement with literature, support for the literary or creative life, hopes/desires/goals for the arts and creative life, experiences with authors or creative figures, arts community involvement, etc.

Submission Open Year-Round.

Details here.

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Home About Subscribe Guidelines Submit Exclusives West End

Join Our Team

SUBSCRIBE TO OUR SUBSTACK

We're happy to announce Roots & Words, the new Substack from Iron Oak Editions and West Trade Review. We’re so excited about this new platform and all the new developments for the journal and the press that are on the horizon.

Get access to our free monthly newsletter as well as the exclusive content for monthly and annual subscribers like new weekly poems, new essays that explore creativity and the creative life, weekly generative creative writing prompts, and live conversations (craft talks, book club discussions, etc.).

Details here.

Our Flash Fiction Contest Is Open.

Send us a flash fiction piece of up to 704 words that engages the reader intellectually, packs an emotional punch, and has something important to teach us about a deep human truth.

The Award: $704 and publication in the Spring 2027 print edition.

Submit Now. Details here.

Substack Highlight:

"What Opens Anyway" by Veronica Tucker

"...something opens

even here,

even through what was meant

to hold."

Read the full poem here.

“Language is a collective, historical, and, even in its limited case—gibberish—enculturated medium.”

Excerpt from Michael Harper’s interview with Jake Fournier, author of Punishment Bag, new from UNM Press.

Read the full interview here.

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